The Sisyphus Exodus
by PenPatronus
Summary: COMPLETE The group gets captured by sadistic farmers who use innocent people to herd walkers. Features Rick and Daryl. WHUMP, HURT/COMFORT
1. Chapter 1

**The Sisyphus Exodus**  
PenPatronus  
Part 1 of 2

A bird's eye view of the Pierce Plantation after the end of the world: in blood-blackened fields that used to grow cotton, surrounding a decaying pale-yellow plantation house, crisscrossed by a desert-dry creek bed, in the throat of an elderly gray-green forest moved five enormous green tractors that dragged wooden wagons full of starving, shackled men, women, and children.

Walkers, lured out of the woods by the rumbling diesel engines and the bitter, earthly stench of fresh flesh, followed the tractors as they looped around the property. The Pierce's learned to let the creatures get within arm's reach of the wagons. The dead had to see their prey, to smell it. When they took the bait, the tractors took off at a pace fast enough to stay safe, but slow enough to keep the Walkers' attention. Neon orange flags helped the drivers avoid the hundreds of hungry bear traps, steel wire snares, and landmines like silver Frisbees filling the three fifty-acre fields. Walkers that weren't blown into confetti impaled themselves on stakes in the creek bed, and got fried by guards in half a dozen homemade watchtowers wielding shotguns and flamethrowers.

When the outbreak started, the Pierce family evacuated with the rest of the county to an Army base five miles north. While everyone else stared at the television, the Pierce's robbed the arsenal and even uprooted a quarter mile of barbed wire fencing to wrap around their house. At first, they used their own livestock to attract the Walkers. Cows, sheep, and horses were tethered to wagons overflowing with chickens, ducks, and rabbits. Eventually they had to upgrade their bait. When they ran out of neighbors they started snatching people off the roads. After dark, when their slaves were locked in the barns, barracks, and chicken coops, the Pierce family ate fresh vegetables at their pristine oak dining room table, and played Yahtzee.

One day at sunset, almost a month after Beth was killed, Daryl Dixon woke up shackled to a wagon with a killer migraine.

It was messed up, Daryl decided, that his growling stomach sounded like a Walker groan. He imagined what Merle would say about that – probably, "Who gives a shit?" He imagined what Rick would say – maybe something about the universal sound of hunger. Maybe something about how the Walkers were just stomachs on legs. No… Rick would get him food first. He'd take care of the empty stomach before talking about it. That was one of the things that Daryl admired about Rick. The man had his priorities straight.

Daryl's eyes felt so heavy that he thought they wouldn't open without a crowbar. When he could finally see – through his lashes like prison bars – he found himself staring down at his lap and the green grass visible between his knees. The grass started to move – or was he moving? The groans got louder than his stomach growls, and Daryl lifted his head to see a dozen Walkers tripping towards him. Close enough that he could smell them. Not close enough that he could kick them away.

"Hi there," a cartoonish voice crooned way too loud and far too happy. "Hello – dude with the wings – hi!"

Daryl looked to his right and found a pair of smiling blondes. Twins, he realized. At least they were twins until his double vision corrected itself. The woman reminded him of Andrea – similar age, similar hair. Slimmer, though. Skeleton-skinny. Yellow teeth and sunburned skin. She smelled like chicken shit. "The hell…" Daryl grunted. He coughed and spat a wad of blood and saliva off the wagon. "Who the hell are you?"

"Savannah," the woman said cheerfully. "From Savannah, Georgia. I'm Savannah from Savannah! Get it?"

Daryl resisted the urge to head-butt her. "Where are we?"

Savannah from Savannah spoke with the panache of a circus ringmaster and grinned with the Cheshire cat's mouth. "Hell! And who are you?" Savannah from Savannah asked. "I've been sitting beside you for a day and a half, but you haven't been very talkative. Once in a pretty while you mutter about somebody called Merle and somebody called Rick, but I'm pretty sure you were still knocked out."

"Day and a…?" Daryl sat up straighter and tested his limbs. His legs hung free – and mere feet from Walker mouths – but his wrists were shackled to the wagon floor behind his back. He turned as far as he could to his left and saw a young Hispanic boy wearing an Atlanta Braves baseball cap. He was Carl's age, maybe a little younger, and he was crying and kicking bloody sneakers at stray Dandelions. "My friends… I was with a group. Where are they?"

"Don't know, but we can find out. Hey, everybody!" Savannah twisted further to her left and Daryl to his right. Over his shoulder, in his peripheral vision, Daryl saw that the wagon was full. At least twenty people of all genders, all ages, and multiple ethnicities were stuffed in. He couldn't tell for certain, but he was pretty sure that not all of them were alive. "Everybody, this is – wait, I didn't get your name."

"Daryl."

"This is Daryl," Savannah shouted. "Everybody say 'hi' to Daryl." When her only answer was a crescendo of the Hispanic boy's cries, Savannah continued. "He's the one with the biker vest and the blood on his head. And the greasy hair. Did anyone see people with him? Friends of his that might have been put on another wagon?"

"Marcy!" a man bellowed. "Is my Marcy here?"

"Is my mom?" a child cried. "Mom? _Mommy_?"

Savannah shook her head apologetically. "Sorry, Daryl. Looks like I'm your only friend here." She grinned. It reminded Daryl of Merle's delighted expression right before he delivered a vicious Charlie-horse.

"We ain't friends," Daryl snorted. "I make a point of not getting friendly with crazy people. Not anymore, anyway." He tested the shackles but couldn't raise his hands more than a couple inches.

"I'm not crazy," Savannah said with her widest smile yet. "I'm happy! This is my last day on the wagon – my last hour!"

"Last hour?" Daryl frowned at her.

"I've been here a week," Savannah said proudly. She lifted her left boot and showed Daryl the teeth marks on the rubber sole. "When the Pierces get you, you have to be on the wagons for a week. I've only been gnawed on a few times. After that you get a less dangerous job. I chose the kitchen. I told them I want to work in the kitchen. I want to make spaghetti."

"You stupid bitch," someone called from the opposite end of the wagon. "How many times do we gotta tell you? You ain't leaving the wagon. Nobody leaves the wagon alive. They told me I'd be here a week. After seven days went by they told me it was ten – just ten days – and then another week went by after that. That was almost a month ago!"

"No, no," Savannah said. She flicked her head to the side and caught a mouthful of her own hair. She chewed on it as she muttered, "They promised. Just a week and I'm safe. Just another hour and I'm safe. They promised… They promised…"

A sound like thunder nearby. A landmine launched three Walkers into the air. Body parts rained down on the wagon and twenty voices shrieked in shock and horror. Daryl watched a dismembered head sail through the air – its eyes wide, nostrils flaring, teeth chomping away. It landed on Savannah's shoulder, mouth first, and clamped on. Daryl leaned back on his hands, braced his fingers against the wood floor and lifted his legs up. He tried to kick the head away like a soccer player, but the Walker's grasp on the shrieking Savannah's shoulder was too tight. Just as the tractor pulled them across a rickety wooden bridge over a Walker-infested creek bed, Darryl got a grip on the head by using his legs like chopsticks. He smashed the skull between his heels and tugged with all his strength. The teeth were still chewing when the skull straddled a wooden stake.

Teardrops pounded Savannah's knees like rain. She wailed – klaxon like – when the tractor cab opened, and two men emerged.

"Check her! She got bit!" Dude number one had a beer belly that peeked out of black body armor splattered with Walker remains. He poked a stubby forefinger against a woman's shoulder three seats behind Daryl. The man decided something – probably that she wasn't alive – withdrew a set of thick keys from dirty overalls, removed the body from the wagon, and shot her between the eyes with a revolver. Dude number two, a tall blond teen with acne like chicken pox, started unshackling Savannah. She shrieked. As soon as her hands were free she clawed at the teen with broken nails. He grunted, and smacked her so hard that she fell to the ground.

" _Hey_!" Daryl barked. He reared back and kicked his legs out with the strength of a horse. Dirty boots smashed against the guy's face and blood exploded from his nose. "You little—" Daryl began.

A clicking sound in his right ear. Daryl froze. Beer belly guy glared at him from behind his gun.

* * *

Rick Grimes risked letting go of the tree limb so that he could hold the binoculars extra steady with both hands. "There you are," he whispered with relief. "Found you. Finally found you." He watched, with a slight smile in the corner of his mouth, as Daryl Dixon wrestled a Walker skull off a woman's shoulder with just his boots. His smile vanished, though, when the wagon was pulled off the bridge and two figures jumped out of the tractor. He could hear the woman's screams as one figure unlocked her chains, smacked her, got kicked by Daryl, and then shoved her into the creek. Somebody in a nearby watchtower (that looked about as steady as a sandcastle) aimed a rifle at the creek and took the shot. The two men turned their attention to Daryl. First, they aimed a gun, but then they set him free, too, and Rick almost tried to fly off his perch when he thought that Daryl was going into the creek as well. Instead, the men re-shackled him but kept his feet on the ground. When the tractor started up again, Daryl was forced to walk behind it – closest to the new batch of Walkers they were luring out of the trees.

Daryl moved… funny. That was Rick's diagnosis. He could walk, and even jog when the tractor picked up speed, but his steps were awkward. He moved like a Walker. Uncoordinated. Dizzy. Rick couldn't make out his friend's face, but he could see the red color on the back of his head. The Herders who kidnapped Daryl from the group must have hit him pretty hard to cause that much blood. He and the others had been missing for almost thirty-six hours – how much had they had to eat and drink in that time?

Another landmine exploded. Daryl tripped, and slipped trying to get back up. He went limp, and the tractor dragged him facedown through the mud. "Get up," Rick whispered, as if his friend could hear him. "Get up, Daryl."

Daryl pulled himself to his feet a second before a Walker latched onto his ankle. Rick breathed a sigh of relief. "Hang on. We're coming for you," he said. He pocketed the binoculars and started to make his way down the fifty-foot tall tree.

Carl waited with Judith at the bottom. "Finally found Daryl," Rick announced before his son could ask. "He's in the last wagon. Looks like he's hurt pretty bad but he's on his feet."

"That's everybody, right?" Carl started listing off the missing members of their group. "Michonne, Carol, and Sasha are in Wagon One. Tyreese Two, Abraham and Glenn Three, Maggie and Tara and Rosita are in Four… Right?" When his dad nodded, Carl said, "We have to get them out of there."

"We will," Rick promised.

"And the others," Carl said. "The others, too, right?" When Rick looked at his boots without speaking, Carl continued. "Dad, all of those people – there must be a hundred on those wagons."

"Son, there's…" Rick gripped Carl's shoulders. He tried and failed to look him in the eye and had to settle for looking past him. "These people have heavy artillery. There are landmines everywhere. We'll be lucky to get our people out alive – damn lucky. We need to focus on them."

Carl frowned. He looked at the dozing baby in his arms for support but found none. "Can we – after we get them back – can we talk about it then? Make a plan then? I – I don't want Daryl and the others to die but after we're sure they're all right then we can rescue people, right?"

Rick swallowed, but that did nothing to soothe the dry lump in his throat. "We'll talk about it then," he finally said. "After."

"You have a plan?" Carl wondered.

Rick nodded. "Yeah. A dumb one. And I'm going to need your help. And Eugene and Gabriel." Rick looked around. "Where are they?"

Carl's face hardened. "Napping."

Rick's face reddened. Without aword he stomped into the woods towards their camp.

* * *

Daryl didn't notice that the wagon stopped moving, so he slammed into it hard enough to knock himself to the ground. He lay there. Just lay there and stared up at the free sky as the light switched from the sun to the moon. Figures in dark camo escorted the Walker bait off the wagon. The crying Hispanic boy's baseball cap fell off and landed on Daryl's stomach. The two looked at each other for a long moment, and then Daryl gestured for the kid to lean over. The boy obeyed, and held still as Daryl put his hat back on. For a second, perhaps less than one, the child smiled. And then he was led away in chains with the rest of them towards a chicken coop. A woman around Carol's age emerged from the farmhouse carrying a big pot of what smelled like oatmeal. She tossed it into the chicken coop and locked the door.

Four other tractors stood empty outside of what looked like horse stables. Someone on #3 must have misbehaved like him, because they got the same punishment of walking behind the wagon. Only half of that somebody made it back, and Daryl couldn't tell if the Walkers got his legs or if a landmine did. He wondered if Rick had been on one of those wagons. Daryl hoped he was, then immediately hated himself for hoping that. He should be hoping that he was the only one who got kidnapped. If the rest of the group had any brains at all, they would've left him behind and gotten as far away from these assholes as possible.

A boot landed on his bruised chest. "I knew you'd be more trouble than you're worth," a voice said. It was a smoker's voice. A four pack a day smoker's voice. Guttural, rattling, coughing more than not. "When they dragged your ass here I could just smell it on you. Smell that trouble."

Daryl blinked. The man was obese and pale. He wore thick overalls over a stained undershirt. A wad of chewing tobacco in his mouth migrated from one cheek to the other. " _Trouble_ is a man smacking a woman and using kids for Walker bait," Daryl said.

"Walker?" The man chuckled. "Haven't heard that one yet. In these parts we call 'em Chompers. In Savannah, where that Savannah lady was from, they call 'em Carnivores."

Daryl's chest ached from the weight of the man's boot. "You writin' the history books, man? Do we get a vote on what to call those things?"

Another chuckle. "Me? Nah. I'm just a farmer trying to get pests off my land. That's all. That's all I am." The man tilted his head and spit a jellybean-sized bit of tobacco into the stables.

"This little plan of yours – shepherding the dead like – like sheep… using… using children as bait…" Daryl struggled for breath. "There are people out there, good people who won't let this go on. Let me go – let us all go – and you Dead Herders might escape some heavy-duty wrath, man."

"Dead Herders? I like that. But, wrath? Big word, son. Big threat. You got an army at your beck and call?"

"Nah. A few men and women with a few guns. And a young boy." Daryl summoned a smile. "And one kickass little baby girl."

The man rolled his eyes. "Look at me all scared. Think she'll miss you? Think that little baby girl will miss you when you're Chomper supper?"

Daryl's only response was squinting his eyes.

"You ain't ate. You ain't drank nothing. What do you think will happen if I leave you chained to this here wagon all night?" The man leaned over and gently patted Daryl's cheek. "You just wait here. Maybe I'll go out looking for that baby girl. Maybe raise her as my own, maybe hang her from a fishing pole—"

Rage-fueled adrenaline kicked in, and Daryl kicked the man right in the crotch. The man crumpled, and Daryl wrapped his chain around the thick neck. He started to squeeze when a shotgun went off. A bullet hit the ground inches from Daryl's face. So much happened in less than a minute. Too much. Hands grabbed him. Rough, calloused hands. Knuckles slammed into his stomach and elbows on the back of his neck. When they were done beating him, the farmers left the one giant bruise that was Daryl Dixon lying face down in the grass.

The tobacco cheeks man called to the nearby sentries, "Don't guard the stables tonight, boys. Let this piece of shit die."

* * *

At sunset, after a powwow with Gabriel and Eugene, Rick climbed another tree to check on his friends' positions and saw the Dead Herders attack Daryl. He watched helplessly through the binoculars as blow after blow landed on his friend's back, head, and torso. Two hundred. That was how many yards Rick had to go through the woods to get to Daryl. It was too early to start his plan with the others – in fact, going in now would ruin everything – but Rick went anyway. He dropped the binoculars and took a shortcut across the field – zigzagging between Walkers, watchtowers, snares, bear traps and landmines, getting the hair on his arms singed when he jumped over a fire… He knew that he'd never get there in time, but he tried anyway. He ran as fast as he could, anyway. He called Daryl's name when the attackers and sentries were out of earshot. No response. When he was twenty feet away from Daryl's bleeding body he slowed to his tiptoes. "Please," Rick whispered to whoever or whatever might be listening. "Not him, too. Please not him, too."

Rick knelt in the mud. Carefully, with more tenderness than he ever thought he would use on Daryl, Rick rolled the bowman over onto his back. "Please," Rick whispered again when he saw the mask of blood covering Daryl's face. He didn't think he could hold his trembling fingers still long enough to feel a pulse, so Rick put his ear against Daryl's parted, swollen lips. "Please…" Eyes closed, his own breath held silently in his lungs, Rick waited for an exhale.

"Ain't gonna kiss me, are ya?" a hoarse voice grumbled.

A single short, wet laugh exploded from Rick's chest. He sat up and met Daryl's half-lidded eyes. "I might hug you," he admitted.

"That might kill me." Daryl wedged his elbows against the ground. He tried and failed to force himself up into a sitting position.

"Here. Come 'ere." Rick wrapped his arms around Daryl's upper body. He pulled Daryl far enough up off the ground that he could slide his left leg beneath his friend's spine, with his left arm pillowed under his head. "I've got water." Rick unscrewed the lid off a plastic bottle and tipped it against Daryl's mouth. "Just like feeding Judith," Rick teased.

Daryl ignored the comment. He swallowed every drop in a single breath and then basked in the sensation of not being thirsty. With no strength, let alone a reason to preserve some warped image of manliness, Daryl shut his eyes, relaxed in Rick's arms and allowed himself to just be held. Held while Rick wiped away the blood from his nose, his lips, and his chin.

Several minutes passed. Rick patted Daryl's cheek to keep him from dozing off. "Let me sleep or I'll bite you," Daryl threatened.

"The Walkers don't sleep, Daryl. You gotta get up."

With Rick's help, Daryl sat up straight, rested there for a moment, and then braced his legs while Rick pulled him up into a standing position. "Ah, shit," Daryl cursed when his knees started to buckle. He grabbed for the wagon, and Rick clutched him, and he hovered there for another long minute until he was certain he wouldn't fall over.

"Crazy shit, huh?" Daryl mumbled when a landmine exploded in the distance. "Landmines. These Dead Herders get some badass creds for that at least. So, what's the plan?"

"The plan?" Rick asked. "The plan is to get you and the others the hell out of here."

Daryl looked at him through a swollen eye. "Our people?"

"When these – these Dead Herders found the camp, Carl and Judith and I took off with Eugene and Gabriel. Everybody else is here. I've been watching for the past twenty-four hours, looking for you guys, looking for weaknesses. They're here - on different wagons that took different routes than yours. Everybody's trapped in the barn now."

"Great." Daryl rolled his eyes. "What's the plan for busting out everyone else? The other wagon people." Rick didn't respond. Daryl looked at his friend like he didn't recognize him. "Rick. Come on, man. I know you. I know you're not going to walk away when there's people being used like worms on a fishing line."

Rick's Adam's apple bobbed up and down. "The one and only thing I care about right now is getting you somewhere safe." He started for the tractor cab, hoping to find keys to Daryl's shackles.

Daryl grabbed Rick's shoulder. "No," he said, his voice barely audible. "Just… No, Rick."

Rick stared at him. "No, what? Daryl—"

"If they ain't leaving, then I ain't either."

" _Daryl, I need you_! I need you." Rick wasn't sure where the hot, angry tears came from. They drowned his eyes. Daryl's face blurred. "I…" Rick started to say, but his emotions plugged his throat like a cork. "I need to tell you something. I need you to _understand_ something," Rick whispered.

Daryl's facial expression asked the question: "What?"

Rick swallowed the air in his throat. "I… I don't think…" He dug his heel into the ground between them.

It was probably a waste of energy, but Daryl squeezed Rick's shoulder and said, "Spit it out, man."

"My first goal is to get you out of here because…" Rick took a deep breath and forced himself to meet Daryl's eyes. "Dammit, Daryl, my children can't survive this world without you," he whispered.

Daryl's lips parted. His eyes fixed on his boots. "Plenty of guys who can fire a crossbow," he said. Daryl wavered a bit and had to lean against the wagon. Fresh blood leaked out of his nose.

"That's not what I mean, Daryl." Rick grasped his friend's upper arms, then his shoulders, and then he cupped his cheeks with both hands. "I'd rather have this," Rick said, and he pointed at Daryl's heart. "I'd rather have you, brother, than a thousand crossbows."

Daryl frowned. "To protect your kids…?" He rubbed the back of his skull and found the reason why he was starting to see more than one Rick Grimes in front of him. No Hershel was needed to diagnose this hell of a concussion.

Rick's palms returned to Daryl's cheeks. "That's a given, but what I'm really talking about is the most important part of survival," he whispered. "I want Carl and Judith to survive as _people_. I want them to see how to be the best kind of person. To see a man who's loyal and selfless and strong. Daryl, I want them to have someone to admire. Somebody who…" Rick sighed and shook his head. Daryl saw the precise moment when he gave in to the ultimatum. "Somebody who would risk his life for a hundred strangers."

Daryl's bangs were in his face, so Rick wasn't sure if those were tears or drops of sweat. "I ain't no role model," he whispered. Daryl wiped his nose with his fist and sniffed. "But I kinda like being Little Asskicker's uncle."

Rick grinned. "God help the first boy she dates."

Daryl's eyes flashed. "The first boy who _looks_ at her is gonna get an arrow up his ass!" Daryl tried to talk again his words slurred together. He teetered, caught himself, and managed to say, "Rick, I can't - I can't s-stand up anymore." Daryl crumpled.

" _Daryl_!" Rick fell with him, clutching Daryl's cheek against his chest. Daryl stayed conscious long enough to frown about being held like a child, but then his eyes rolled back into his skull and he passed out.

" _Shit_ ," Rick sputtered.

"Double shit for you," said a female voice. Rick looked up to find a brown-haired, blue-eyed woman in her fifties pointing a pair of revolvers at his head. As she approached he caught a whiff of oatmeal from the apron she wore. "I don't know who you are, but I'm gonna call you stupid," she purred. "So, come on, Mr. Stupid. Let's go to the barn together. If you'd carry your friend there, I'd appreciate it." She tossed him a set of keys.

Rick put one hand up in surrender after he unshackled Daryl. "Ma'am, my name is—"

A bullet whizzed past Rick's neck, taking a few hairs from his beard with it. "No time for chitchat, Mr. Stupid. Time for you to get moving."

Glaring, nostrils flaring, Rick slowly stood and held up both palms. "Ya'll got good intentions, wanting to get rid of the Walkers. But this ain't the civilized way to do it."

Bullet number two missed Daryl's shoulder by an inch. "Let me be clear, sir," the woman said. "Patience ain't one of my virtues. You move right now, or I'll shoot your friend here in the face. Understand?"

"Yes, ma'am," Rick growled. He yanked Daryl up into a standing position and then tossed him over his shoulder. The woman kept her right gun on Daryl and her left on Rick as she steered him to the barn. Two guards, one she referred to as "son," pulled open the barn door. The second that Rick's boot touched the threshold, the woman's son kicked him in the back and launched him into the room. Daryl went flying and Rick ended up face down in moldy hay.

Rick looked up to see Glenn and Maggie's shocked faces. "I, uh…" he stuttered. "I'm here to rescue you."

* * *

The Pierce's three-story barn was smaller but newer than Hershel's. They'd reinforced the walls with aluminum panels and stuffed every window with barbed wire. Like everywhere else, there was no electricity – every necessity was lit by lanterns and flashlights. The current residents – the Chomper Bait – did their best to make living there more manageable. The clean straw was shoveled to one corner, and the moldy hay to another. Saucers that used to hold milk for kittens now caught rainwater that dripped from marble-sized holes in the ceiling. Mama Pierce gave them enough oatmeal for each man, woman, and child to have almost half a cup. They were in the middle of eating when two more inmates were tossed through the door. Tyreese, Rosita, and Maggie immediately combined all their oatmeal into one bowl and gave it to Carol, who managed to coax Daryl to swallow it down.

Daryl lay on his back in a single layer of hay with his head pillowed in Carol's lap. When he finished the oatmeal, he started to fidget. "What's wrong?" she asked him, running her fingers through his hair. "I mean, what's wrong-er?"

"Not a big fan of all this attention," Daryl croaked. His pseudo-family had gathered around him in a tight circle. Ten faces stared: Carol, Rick, Glenn, Maggie, Rosita, Abraham, Sasha, Michonne, Tara, and Tyreese.

Rick gave pointed looks at some of them. Michonne, Rosita, Abraham, Sasha, Tara, and Tyreese politely excused themselves and moved a few feet away to give Daryl some space. They joined a group of adults listening to an elderly woman tell stories about her grandchildren (the best entertainment they could find). "Better?" Rick asked Daryl when it was just their original family… what was left of them: Rick, Daryl, Carol, Glenn, and Maggie.

"I'll live." Daryl took a deep breath and winced his way through the exhale. He coughed, and suddenly his eyes went wide when he couldn't inhale.

"Sit him up!" Maggie squeaked. She grabbed onto Daryl's jacket and pulled while Rick pushed. Glenn reached across Carol and smacked Daryl in the back. He coughed, and blood splashed across Carol's jeans. "Rick, keep him upright. Even if he passes out, keep him up."

Rick scooted behind Daryl. He sat up straight with his back against a haystack and pulled Daryl's spine against his chest. Daryl's head lolled against his shoulder. His labored breathing sounded like a panting dog. When he started to sag to the left, Rick wrapped his arms around his body and held him still. "Is he gonna be ok?" Rick asked. He looked around the circle for an answer. " _Maggie_?"

Maggie jumped a few inches. "I don't know," she whispered. "Rick, I'm sorry, real sorry, but I just don't know." She pressed the back of her hand against Daryl's pale cheek and then his sweating brow. Glenn cocked his eyebrows and Maggie just shook her head at him.

"We have to get him out of here. Get him some fresh water, have him rest," said Carol. "Rick, I think he's really in trouble. He looks as bad as I did when I was bleeding internally."

"Shut up, I'm fine," Daryl mumbled. "Can take on… all of ya…" He made a fist but couldn't lift it.

"If we can figure out where they're storing their weapons then we might have a shot," Glenn said.

"Nobody gets out of this barn unless they're in shackles," Maggie reminded him. "They take us to the wagons straight from here. If we're going to escape it needs to be before we're out there surrounded by landmines."

"I've seen at least six automatic weapons and one grenade launcher," Carol reported. "Rosita counted seven shotguns and two sniper rifles."

"Damn," Rick muttered. "Do we know anything about these people? How many there are? Who the leader is?"

Glenn pointed over his shoulder. Daryl recognized the same kid – the one in the Braves hat. "Antonio told me that this is the Pierce Plantation. He and his family lived about five miles north of here. Got snatched up just like we did."

"If we can just hold out for a couple more days, maybe we'll be able to get enough intel to plan an escape," Maggie said.

Carol's fingers returned to Daryl's hair. "He doesn't have a couple days."

"He doesn't have twelve hours," Rick said.

"Quit talkin' 'bout me like I ain't here." Daryl sounded like he was trying to talk around a swollen tongue.

"What do you mean twelve hours?" Glenn asked Rick.

"I mean I found him because they left him out there to get eaten. It was an execution. If they don't kill him tonight, they'll do it at dawn."

Tears hovered in Maggie's eyes. "Then what do we do?"

"Carl," Daryl grunted. He cleared his throat and coughed against Rick's collarbone. "Carl'll come through for us."

Carl Grimes was a lousy singer, so he just rehearsed the lullaby in what he hoped was a soothing whisper. "A gentle breeze from Hushabye Mountain softly blows o'er Lullaby Bay. It fills the sails of boats that are waiting… waiting to sail your worries away." He placed a delicate kiss on his sister's forehead and said, "Taka a nap, Judy. I think it's gonna be a hell of a night."

Father Gabriel's face scrunched up like he smelled something rotten or tasted something sour. "Is it necessary to use such language?" he asked as Carl put the baby in a wicker basket stuffed with tattered blankets. Judith cooed a series of vowels at him, and then passed out asleep in the middle of her own sentence.

Carl flicked his hat up a few inches so that he could look Gabriel in the eye. "Is that really what any of us should be worrying about?" the boy asked. He gestured to the Grimes group's camp. "My dad and the others are missing. All I have to work with is an infant, a cowardly priest and a socially awkward liar – _hey_! What are you doing with our tents?" Carl hissed at Eugene, who crouched across the campfire from him.

Eugene froze. He had a knife in his right hand and his mullet was tied off his neck with a shoestring. "We need a distraction. I'm building a distraction."

"With our tents?" Carl fumed.

"And a tricycle," Eugene said. Carl couldn't tell if he was serious. "As many stones and bricks as we can find, too. Lots of debris in the woods if you pay attention. If all goes according to plan I should be ready before sun up."

"Are we seriously considering trying to rescue them?" Gabriel asked. "The three of us verses Walkers and a horde of inbred rednecks with grenade launchers and landmines? We'll die trying."

"Yes," Carl said matter-of-factly, "yeah, we will. That's what we do. My dad and Daryl wouldn't leave you behind if you were in there, no matter how useless you are."

"They know how to shoot a gun!" Gabriel reminded him. "I don't even feel comfortable holding one!"

"Then you'll hold the baby," Carl decided. "You babysit Judith, Eugene will cause the distraction, and I'll rescue everyone. How does that sound?"

"Awful," Eugene said without looking up from his task. "Ultimately doomed to failure."

Carl ignored him. He took his dad's binoculars out of his jacket pocket and scanned the woods for the fifth time in ten minutes. The forest was empty. Most of the local Walkers were either in the fields or on their way to them. Even the birds had been scared off by the landmine blasts. It was almost midnight, and no cavalry was coming to his rescue.

Carl was alone.

With his binoculars, he located an odd-looking tree about thirty yards away. A few adjustments with the binocular's zoom and he managed to focus on something round on the tree bark. Curious, he stepped over the fire, ignored Gabriel's questions, and marched to the tree. The carving was a circle with an "X" in the center – or maybe an "X" with a circle around it, he wasn't sure. He'd seen that symbol before. Several times. But he didn't think once about it, let alone twice. Curious, Carl raised the binoculars again and looked around. There – another one – another mark on a tree another thirty yards away. After chasing down two more, Carl came across the symbol on the ground, carved into a slab of stone the size of a coffin lid. Below that was a plaque screwed into the rock. Carl kicked the stray stones and leaves away, wiped it clean with his shirt sleeve and pointed his flashlight at it. He scanned a bunch of names and dates, noted that the author was the Georgia Historical Society, and then found the miracle he was hoping for.

The plaque read:

 _Although the escape routes that slaves used during the American Civil War were called the Underground Railroad, they were never on train tracks, and were rarely located under ground. This is a common misconception. The slaves walked north, usually at night, from safe house to safe house. Some traveled with a guide, others followed the North Star, and a variety of secret symbols carved into trees_.

Carl shined his flashlight back on the symbol on the trees. Lips twitching in a slight smile, he returned his attention to the plaque.

 _One exception to the rule is the Pierce Plantation. The Pierce family settled on this property in 1777. They owned several dozen indentured servants – as many as a hundred at one point. According to local folklore, the Pierce's only removed their slaves' chains when they were locked in the barracks at night. They were shackled all day, even in the cotton fields. That left the slaves no choice but to spend their nights digging an underground tunnel from the barracks into the woods. From there they would find the symbols and start their journey north._

"Holy cow," Carl breathed. Grunting, he shifted the stone slab as far to the side as possible, and discovered a fathomless, Tyreese-sized, dead dark hole in the earth. A flick of Carl's head and he dropped his sheriff's hat on the ground, and then jumped into the tunnel.

Carl began to crawl on dirty hands and even dirtier knees. He remembered seeing Daryl hold a flashlight in his mouth and Carl did the same so that he could pick up speed. The sloping tunnel twisted around tree roots. As he traveled he lost all sense of direction, and a fair amount of time. It was at least fifteen minutes before the tunnel sloped upwards again. Wider, more compacted dirt awaited Carl at the end. He pointed his flashlight up and found a slab of wood. It was heavy, and with each inch more loose stones and spiders rained down on him, but he was able to scooch it far enough to peer out.

"Holy _crap_ ," Carl whispered. The slave barracks had long since been converted into a tool shed. Carl found hammers, saws, drills, crowbars, and many more tools that he didn't know the names of. Since The Turn, the Pierce's had converted the tool shed into their arsenal. Carl couldn't begin to count all the guns, packs of ammo, grenades, etc. He tiptoed through the bus-sized shed to the moonlight that snuck through the closed door. It was locked from the outside, but Carl had several pairs of bolt cutters to choose from. When the chains fell away, Carl opened the door as slowly as possible, and just as silently.

Seeing no one, hearing no one, Carl emerged and said, " _Holy shit_ " when he realized where he was. Carl clamped his hands over his mouth. He didn't want a shout of joy to wake up the people in the plantation house. The shed was attached to the rear of the chicken coops. Carl was only twenty yards away from the barn.

Gabriel was pacing when Carl got back to the camp. Eugene was hyper focused, concentrating so hard on his little tent-tricycle project that he hadn't even noticed that Carl had left. "Where the hell did you go?" Gabriel bellowed. He immediately clapped his hands over his mouth, shocked at the words he'd used.

Carl, all smiles, said, "I know how to save them."

* * *

It wasn't the sound of Rick's voice that woke Daryl up. Daryl had slept through a lot of things in his life. But the urgency, the anxiety that tinted Rick's words, that was what his unconscious brain determined was more important that sleep. Daryl blindly reached for his weapons, but his knife and crossbow were nowhere to be found. Gentle hands grasped his wrist, and a calloused thumb rubbed his palm. "You're missing it," Carol whispered.

"Is he giving another damn speech?" Daryl grunted. He started blinking his eyes before he tried to see with them. The barn came into view – three stories of nasty hay and sunburned faces and scared kids. Almost a hundred people, he reckoned. Every flashlight was pointed at Rick. It put him literally in the spotlight.

A swift exhale through her nose was the closest that Carol came to a laugh. "It's a good speech. You don't want to miss it."

"How many times has he used the word 'together'?"

"Enough that if we made a drinking game of it we'd _both_ be on our asses."

"I'm not on my ass I'm just…" Daryl did a sit up and managed it without getting dizzy. Nauseated, yes, but not dizzy. "Well, now I'm on my ass. But that's an improvement." Carol gave him a patient smile. "Stop."

"And this is the most important thing," Rick was saying. He stood in the center of the barn on a bale of hay, and rotated as he spoke to make eye contact with everyone. "We have to stick together. This won't work unless we're all in. Our only advantage is our numbers. We gotta use it." Rick glanced at Daryl and saw that he was awake. He checked his watch, took a deep breath and said, "The sunrise is in thirty minutes. Get ready."

"You ever think of going into politics?" Daryl asked. The second that Rick jumped down from the hay, two-thirds of the people in the barn jumped up and started looking for stray nails, sharp pieces of wood, string, anything they could use to fight their captors.

Rick smiled a tired smile. "It's not hard to convince people to fight for their own lives."

"What's the plan?" Daryl asked.

"The Pierce's, they'll open the barn at sunrise. We'll all gather at the door and storm them, hard and fast. People who have been here the longest say that there aren't any more than four men escorting them to the wagons at once. We catch 'em off guard, get their weapons, make for the woods. Make for the camp."

Daryl squinted. "Got me thinking about Terminus. About how they gassed us through the roof of that train car. Are you sure this is gonna work?"

"From the sound of it they never vary their routines. I'm not worried," Rick said. Daryl caught him glancing at the ceiling, and Rick blushed. "Maybe a little bit. Mostly because it'll slow me down if I have to carry your ass out of here."

"You better not leave me behind. I'm precious cargo. If you'd avoid any pressure here or here," Daryl said, pointing at his head and his ribs, "I'd appreciate it."

Rick's smile widened. "If I said that you'd call me a pussy."

"Yep. Yeah, I would."

"So charming," Carol said, rolling her eyes. "Let's get you on your feet, Prince Charming." Carol took one hand and Rick took the other, and together they helped Daryl stand up.

"See, I'm better – feeling a lot better," Daryl said a tad too quietly. He kept his arms around their shoulders for a good twenty seconds before removing them. He stayed up, solid and still. "You don't have to carry me, Rick. Now there ain't nothin' to worry about."

"I wouldn't be too sure about that," a new voice boomed so loudly that it echoed off the wood and aluminum walls. A dozen guns were cocked at once, reminding Daryl of popcorn popping. "Where you see strength in numbers," the voice continued, "I see camouflage. I see infiltration." A figure walked forward out of one of a million shadows. Tobacco rotated between his cheeks. His tongue rolled, and his lips molded, and the patriarch of the Pierce family spit a wad of tobacco at Rick's boots. "It's just so easy to hide in this crowd." Figures stepped forward with handguns pulled out of overalls and vest pockets. Rick recognized half of them from his observations in the trees. He shifted to his left one slow inch after another until his chest was between the bullets and Daryl's heart.

"I told this one that I could smell trouble on him," the Patriarch said, gesturing at Daryl. "But it's you. You're the real threat. The voice of any group is stronger than the muscle."

"Stay behind me," Rick whispered to Daryl and Carol. He sensed others moving closer, guarding his flank. Shapes in his peripheral vision that were Sasha-shaped and Abraham-shaped.

The Patriarch jumped on the same bale of hay that Rick just vacated. He turned in a circle as he spoke, too. "I like to do this every so often. Sneak myself and a few of the boys in with the crowd. See if anyone here is stupid enough to plan an escape." His attention returned to Rick. "I'm sorry, son. You won't be alive long enough to see how your little revolution works out."

The barn seemed to hold its breath. One hundred people stared at the Patriarch as he took a small jar of chewing tobacco out of his back pocket and stuffed the contents into his cheek. "Jeremy," he said to one of the armed men, "would you escort Mr. Grimes up here, please? Thank you, son." He gestured at the floor at the foot of the hay bale. Rick gave Daryl and Carol an 'it will be all right' look and allowed the man to take him by the arm and lead him to the Patriarch's feet. Jeremy kicked his knees from behind and Rick ended up kneeling right in the tobacco spit splash zone. "Rick Grimes…" the Patriarch began. "Sir, it's been a privilege listening to you and your friends' adventures these past few hours. You've been through hell time and time again. And you, Rick, you always come through. You think you'll come through for these people." The Patriarch gestured to the crowd. "You're their own personal Moses – destined to lead the slaves out of captivity and into the Promised Land." A wad of tobacco the size of Rick's thumbnail splattered on the ground an inch from his knee. "I respect you, sir." After the jar was back in his left pocket, the Patriarch retrieved a handgun out of his right. Like an anxious child clicking a pen, he cocked his gun, un-cocked it, and cocked it again. "I respect you, but I'm going to kill you. I'm going to kill you, and all of your friends."

Rick's skin instantly transformed from bone-dry to soaking in sweat. He glared up at the Patriarch with clenched teeth. "I'm not trying to be Moses," he declared. "I'm just trying to protect the people I love from crazy sons of bitches like you."

"Crazy?" This time the tobacco hit Rick's pants. "The world's gone to hell, boy. What's crazy is failing to do anything and everything we can to save it. Sacrifices must be made. Many must die so that a few can survive. My family and I are alive because we use Chomper Bait. You must die because you're trying to take our bait away. And I have to wonder…" The Patriarch snapped the clip out of his gun, turned it over and dumped all the bullets into his palm. "I have to wonder why you bother. Do you really not see the patterns in your stories?"

Rick dug his fingers into his thighs and held his tongue.

"Please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong," the Patriarch said. "I only heard your story once, but I'll do my best to summarize it." He held up one of the bullets so that the whole barn could see. "You, Rick Grimes, you fought your way to your family. You had a nice safe campsite and then… Then it all went to hell." The Patriarch dropped the bullet back into the clip. He picked up another. "You went to the CDC and that went to hell." Number two slid down into the clip. "You went to a farm – hell. A prison, a terminus, a church…" After each location he dropped another bullet. "Did I forget anything?"

"Yeah, the part where I paid your mom a visit," Daryl quipped. He made a lewd gesture that caused the Patriarch's face to turn red. Jeremy didn't wait for the order. He grabbed Daryl by the jacket and shoved him down to the floor beside Rick, who helped him back up to his knees.

"This is my point," the Patriarch growled, his eyes darting back and forth between Rick and Daryl. "This is your pattern: no matter what you do, Rick, it goes to Hell. Everywhere you go is dangerous. Everyone you save will die." The Patriarch jumped down from the bale, put his fists on his knees and leaned towards Rick's face. "You listed some of their names. T, Sophia, Dale, Andrea, Hershel, Lori…" In his peripheral vision, Rick saw Daryl reach for him. His hand gripped Rick's shoulder – to show his support or to steady himself, Rick wasn't sure. "You aren't Moses. You're _Sisyphus_."

"Who the hell is Sissy-puss?" Daryl asked.

Maggie, who stood between Glenn and Carol, spoke up. "Sisyphus is a Greek myth," she said. Muscles in her throat vibrated as she cleared it. "A deceitful man went to hell. His punishment was to roll a giant boulder up a hill every day for all eternity. And every time he got the boulder to the top, it rolled all the way back down."

"That's right, Maggie." The Patriarch smiled at Rick with a mouth full of yellow-brown teeth. "You aren't on an exodus to the Promised Land, Rick Grimes. You're just pushing a boulder up a hill." He raised his gun and gently pressed it against Rick's forehead. "How about I put you out of your misery?"

Daryl's fingers trembled and the muscles in his cheeks twitched. "Don't," he said, and then whispered, "please."

Déjà vu passed through Rick's heart. He knew what his friend was going to say next. "Stay out of this, Daryl," he begged.

"It's me you wanted to execute." Daryl spread his arms. "You want blood? Take mine."

"It's not blood I want," the Patriarch growled. "What I really want is…" Suddenly he sheathed his weapon and stood up straight. "Chad, how many Chompers are in the field right now?"

"Two dozen, last I saw, Pa," the blond guard reported.

The Patriarch pointed at Rick and Daryl. "Lock up the barn," he barked. "Let's take these two for a walk."

Fog hovered in the Pierce Plantation fields. The neon orange flags that marked the safe routes between rows of landmines were only visible when Rick and Daryl were almost on top of them. Jeremy, Chad, and the Patriarch seemed to have the path memorized. They steered Rick and Daryl by pressing their guns against their spines. Rick looked at the eastern horizon and saw the first ray of sunlight sneak through tree branches. He took a deep breath, savoring the oxygen, the mist, and a whiff of lavender coming from the woods. Not a bad palette of scents for his final seconds. Rick dug deep into his heart's mind and found four memories to hold him afloat: racing bikes in the school parking lot with Shane, Lori smiling on their wedding day, Carl saying "Daddy" for the first time, and Judith giggling while Daryl played peek-a-boo.

 _ **CRACK**_

Rick jumped at the shotgun blast. He whirled left, half-expecting, and one hundred percent terrified to see if the gun took Daryl's head off, but it was just Jeremy sniping a Walker. Daryl mirrored Rick's expression of terror and when both saw that the other was intact, they shared a relieved smile. "It's been a hell of a ride," Daryl said. "Guess this is the part where I'm supposed to say that, uh, of all the cops who have pointed a gun at me, you're the least… pussy-ish."

"Pussy-ish?" A crack of a laugh erupted from Rick's chest. "Love you, too."

Daryl nodded. Rick nodded back, and then wrapped the four memories around his heart and prepared himself.

Prepared to fight like hell.

A landmine went off less than fifty feet away. Rick felt it in the ground and his ears started to ring. "Pa…" Chad said from behind Daryl's shoulder. "We're almost at the creek. Is this, uh, is this far enough…?"

"The watchtower," the Patriarch said. He was huffing and puffing from the long walk. "There's rope in the closet. I want them tied up. Nice and pretty like Thanksgiving dinner."

Rick saw the watchtower rise from the fog like the mast of a ship. "Tower" was far too flattering of a word to describe it. It was little more than a fifteen-foot-high staircase in the middle of the field. The plywood that encircled the stairs seemed as flimsy as a bed sheet on a laundry line. Rick imagined a support beam snapping like a toothpick when he leaned against it but, unfortunately, those columns were practically made of steel compared to the rest of it. While the Patriarch pointed the guns, Chad flattened Daryl against a column as wide as he was. He tied Daryl's wrists behind his back. Next, he wrapped thick cords across Daryl's chest, rendering his arms less than useless. When he bent to tie up Daryl's knees, the Patriarch stopped him. "Leave their legs free," he ordered. "It's only fair to give them a little bit of a chance to defend themselves." Jeremy tied Rick up the same way against the other pole. Daryl was on Rick's left, more than an arm's reach and a half away.

"I'm staying down here. Up you go. Both of you." The Patriarch pointed at the watchtower. "Keep your guns pointed down at them. When I give you the signal, or if one of them manages to get loose, shoot them both in the head."

The two boys exchanged glances. "You're not coming up?" Chad asked. "Pa, you can see them get chewed up just fine from the tower. It ain't a front row seat but it's close enough."

The Patriarch answered them with the sternest of looks. Jeremy and Chad shrugged and climbed up the stairs. Rick felt the vibrations of their boots on the wood. When the boys were out of earshot, the Patriarch walked up to Rick. Before Rick could react, he took a knife out of a sheath hidden in the small of his back, lifted it high and plunged it down. Rick shut his eyes. He heard Daryl yell, " _ **NO**_!" and felt the rush of wind of the descending weapon.

The Patriarch embedded the blade in the wood two centimeters from Rick's ear. When Rick opened his eyes, he found the man's face inches from his – nose nearly touching nose, sour breath against his chin. "Tell me," the man hissed, "tell me what you did to get those Chompers out of that prison yard."

Rick was taken aback. Far back. "What? We killed them."

"No shit." The Patriarch's eyes looked watery. "Not all at once. Not through three layers of fences. You had to get inside to corral them. How did you do that?"

"Uh, we, uh…" Rick stammered. "We drew them away from the door. While I made a run for it the others got their attention – yelled, banged on the fence, stuck their fingers through—"

"Ha!" the Patriarch said with half a laugh.

Rick heard the frown in Daryl's voice when he spoke. "It's not the same thing, man."

"You used them," the Patriarch said to Rick. Excitement bumped his voice up an octave. "You lured the Chompers by using living humans. Just like us."

"Those 'living humans' were my friends!" Rick spat back. "They helped willingly. They were out of danger behind the fences. _They weren't slaves shackled to a wagon_!" The Patriarch's face fell for half a moment before it flickered back to normal. Rick scrambled to get his thoughts together. Part of him calculated that this conversation would either save or damn him. He sensed the man's desperation, his confliction, his confusion. Rick knew what the man wanted him to say.

And he wouldn't say it.

"Never, ever in a million years will your actions be justified," Rick said. He felt something wash over him – something resembling peace. "I won't tell you you're right. I won't tell you that you had no choice. You and I are not the same and _you are not forgiven_."

The Patriarch opened his mouth to speak.

That was when a tricycle flew out of the trees.

* * *

Glenn pressed his nose against the barn door and watched, through an infinitesimal hole, as Daryl and Rick were marched into the fields. Maggie came up behind him and put a hand on his shoulder. "We'll see them again," she said, and it was the worst lie Glenn had ever heard her tell.

Abraham was pacing the floor. "We can still do it," he said in a drill Sargent's voice. "We can all still pounce the next time those doors open. Just because Rick and Daryl are gone doesn't mean we're dead."

Michonne stepped into his path. She didn't say anything, didn't do anything but stare him down. He got the message. He shut up.

"Can you see them?" Sasha asked Glenn. She tried to find a peephole of her own but most of the barn was watertight.

"It's too foggy," Glenn complained. The noise of a shot echoed off the house, off the stables, off the chicken coops. Everyone gasped. They looked to Glenn for answers he couldn't give. "I don't know," he said. "I can't see if – if that hit them."

"It didn't." Carol spoke with finality. Like a prophet. "Those men… They're walking miracles. Almost like nothing can kill them."

"Knock on wood," Tara said. She bumped her knuckle against the barn wall for luck.

Tyreese, who stood in the rear of the group, jumped when a hand tugged on his sleeve. He looked down and saw Antonio, the boy in the Braves hat. "Hey, little man," Tyreese greeted. "You need something?"

The boy's English was strong, but so was his accent, and he had to ask his question twice for Tyreese to understand. "That man's name was Daryl?"

Tyreese shook his head. "Yeah. Why do you ask?"

Antonio adjusted his hat. "He was on the wagon. He was nice to me."

More noise – more of a crash than the clap of gunfire. "The hell…?" Glenn whispered. He leaned up from the door, wiped his eye and then peeked through again.

"Glenn?" Maggie pressed.

"I, uh…" Glenn cleared his throat. "I swear I just saw a red tricycle fly out of the trees and hit a landmine. Holy shit – there's a hubcap – there's a boulder!"

"What?" half of the group gasped. An almighty racket rose from the fields. Individual landmines every other second, but then so many that they merged together. It was like someone was jumping on a sheet of bubble wrap – if the bubbles were the size of hot air balloons.

Glenn clapped his hands over his ears and kept reporting everything he saw. "It's coming from the south tree line. Bricks, logs, shoes, hammers, ashtrays, basketballs, coffee cups… That – that was a possum. Holy – that's a bowling ball!"

Rosita lied down on her stomach. She pressed her ear against the floor and crawled until she discovered a small gap between the wooden wall and the wooden floor. She found one just in time to see a small television smash into one of the watchtowers. A nearby Walker got caught in the blast and flew in four different directions. "It's just a bunch of junk!" she reported to whoever was in earshot. "Somebody's throwing it!"

"There's no way someone could throw a bicycle that far!" Sasha said.

"So, what, is somebody shooting stuff out of a cannon?"

Michonne shook her head. "Wouldn't fit. It's gotta be a slingshot of some sort. Somebody built a damn catapult in the woods!"

"Eugene?" Rosita and Abraham said.

Sasha laced her fingers and rested her palms on the top of her head. "Why?"

Maggie could barely be heard over the sound of so many landmines erupting at once. "To set off the mines! To spring the snares and the bear traps!"

"Well that's quite a show but we're still stuck in the barn!" Carol sputtered.

"No, we're not." Tyreese was the only one facing the back of the barn. His grin took up his whole face. He tapped on Carol's shoulder, who tapped Maggie, who tapped Glenn, who tapped Michonne, and so on. The whole group turned just in time to see a chainsaw take out the last panel of wood in the center of the back wall. Nobody heard its rumbling over the cacophony outside. It powered down, went silent, and then a boot kicked the new door to the ground. Standing there with a chainsaw in his hands, a Samurai sword over one shoulder, and a crossbow over the other, with his dad's hat perched lopsidedly on his head, was Carl Grimes.

Carl tried to stifle his proud smile, but he couldn't help it. "Follow me."

* * *

Rick watched, with eyes so wide they hurt, as the little red tricycle smashed into the ground and tripped a landmine. It exploded into smaller pieces that were still large enough to set off more landmines. The Patriarch frowned at Rick's expression – assuming that it was just a ruse to make him turn around – but he couldn't help but look when so many bombs erupted at once. He pivoted, and stumbled back in shock. A muddy football beheaded a Walker on its way down, missed a landmine, and rolled into the creek bed. Two lace-less boots ricocheted off the watchtower, flew spinning to the left and right, and exploded into nothing but rubber confetti. At that second, Daryl kicked the Patriarch's handgun out of his grasp, jumped, and wrapped his legs around the man's neck. Sweaty hands clawed at Daryl's pants, punched his boots, elbowed his shinbones. Daryl roared in pain when the Patriarch kicked him in the chest. Rick heard something crack.

Rick rotated his head to the left. The Patriarch's knife stuck out of the wooden column at his eyelevel. By standing on his tiptoes, Rick was able to clamp his teeth onto the sweat and tobacco-soaked handle. Pulling a knife out of solid wood with his teeth was harder than holding a Walker back with one hand. He tried to wiggle it back and forth, up and down, and back and forth again. One of his teeth cracked right down to the gum. When it finally loosened, the weight hit him all at once. Rick wasn't prepared for the bulk of it and it nearly slipped out of his bite. Using his tongue and shaking his head to the side little by little, Rick managed to rotate the knife until he held onto it with his front teeth and it stuck straight out of his mouth like a tongue. "Dare-oh!" he grunted at his friend. " _Dare-oh_!"

The Patriarch was too strong for the weakened archer. Daryl just couldn't adjust his grip enough to break his enemy's neck, or squeeze his knees enough to suffocate him. So instead, he lined the Patriarch up with Rick and kicked as hard as he could. With a cry, the Patriarch stumbled backwards, just as speedy as the bricks raining down around them. The space where his neck and skull met slammed right into Rick's knife. He was dead before he hit the ground. "Toss it," Daryl grunted. He slid straight down, twisted as far as the ropes would let him, and wiggled his fingers at Rick.

Rick had to throw the knife three feet and miraculously managed to only be three inches short of his goal. "Left," Rick directed. Daryl's fingers scratched through the grass. "Another inch." When the pads of Daryl's fingers found the hilt, the knife was instantly flipped over and he started sawing through the ropes.

Another series of explosions courtesy of a couple of tires. Those ones were close enough that Rick's ears started ringing, and for a whole minute that was all he could hear. His brain tried to comprehend what was going on. Nothing about a porcelain poodle falling and shattering on an iron bear trap made sense. He was going over every option when Daryl finally cut and shrugged off his ropes. He took one step towards Rick, stopped, and threw the knife. Rick felt it whizz by his ear and heard a grunt when it hit its target. Rick looked back over his shoulder and saw Chad topple over with the blade in his throat. Daryl stumbled over, dislodged the knife and started sawing away at Rick's bonds. "You see the other one?" he asked.

"Jeremy? No. Think this is Eugene's doing?"

Daryl looked around the field at the Walkers getting knocked down like bowling pins, the bear traps snapping like crocodile jaws, and the wire snares zipping left and right. He shook his head in awe at the sight of a crooked golf club flying end over end out of the tree line to pierce a Walker right through the eye socket. "Don't give a shit if it's the Easter Bunny," Daryl snorted, "we're getting out of here."

"You son of a bitch!" a voice roared. Jeremy appeared out of the fog of smoke and dust. The shotgun he pointed alternated between Daryl's face and Rick's. "You better say your prayers right now!"

"Don't!" Rick screamed when Daryl pounced between him and the gun.

A torrential downpour of bullets. Somewhere beyond the fog a dozen automatic weapons opened fire. Jeremy was shot in the head right as his finger twitched against the trigger. Daryl caught the shotgun with one hand as Jeremy dropped to the dirt. A bullet nicked the watchtower and Rick slid down the pole, landing on his butt with his upper body still tethered to the column. "Stay low!" Daryl shouted. He started to cut the binds but first things first – he crouched behind Rick and shielded his friend's body with his own. Rick couldn't be a smaller target with the ropes situated where they were, so Daryl opted to be a bigger one. "Are they shooting at the Walkers?"

"At the tree line." Rick looked up at the sky. He saw sunlight, Walker bits flying about with the bullets, but no more tricycles. "Dammit, whoever was catapulting that debris isn't doing it anymore. Might've got hit."

Daryl finally broke through the ropes around Rick's wrists, so he got to work on his torso. "I'm sure it ain't Carl. I'm sure."

"I'm sure it is Eugene," Rick said sadly. "We have to get back to the others. Maybe this chaos gave them a chance to escape." When he was finally free, when the bullets faded out and then stopped altogether, Rick held up his hand and let Daryl pull him to his feet. Both men heard gunshots again. They judged the sound and calculated that the weapons weren't facing them anymore. Rick started to move out from the shelter of the watchtower.

"Whoa, hey, whoa." Daryl grabbed Rick's elbow. "You best look where you're going."

Rick followed Daryl's pointing finger. "Oh, no," he moaned.

A neon orange flag was on fire. More were scattered about on the visible ground. The landmines had uprooted the markers. There was no safe passage through the field now.

* * *

Glenn went into kid-in-a-candy-store mode when Carl opened the shed door. He stuffed his pants pockets with ammo and grenades, hung two knives from his belt and hoisted a semi-automatic over each shoulder. "If people hurry they can make it through in ten minutes," Carl was explaining about the Underground Railroad. Michonne was reacquainting herself with her sword while Tyreese and Sasha examined the tunnel. "Everybody should arm themselves – take a weapon before then go into the tunnel, just in case."

Rosita and Abraham stood just outside the door with ten civilians. "In case of what?" she asked.

"Eugene's in the woods and I left Gabriel guarding the other end of the tunnel," Carl said. "With all this racket we might find some Walkers waiting for us. He's got Judith. He'll just run."

"We should hurry!" Abraham barked. "That commotion'll wake the Herders up any second."

"I'll lead the first group," Rosita volunteered. "See you all on the other side." She took a rifle and a flashlight, and slid feet first into the hole. Antonio tossed his Braves hat aside and crawled in after her.

Glenn, Sasha, and Michonne joined Abraham outside. "We should move people from the barn in groups of ten," Glenn recommended. "I don't want them standing in line. The Herders will notice us for sure."

Carl led the group back towards the barn. "I think they're pretty damn distracted," Abraham said. Four men and two women armed with automatic weapons ran from the front porch of the plantation house to the edge of the field. One of the bricks catapulted so far that it nearly hit the Pierce's matriarch in the head.

"Carol!" Glenn yelled when he entered the barn. "Grab ten people and follow Sasha to the shed. Tara! Gather up ten more. You, too, Maggie." The crowd was reluctant at first, and moved in brief, short distance blobs, but as soon as they were outside in the fresh dawn air they seemed to snap out of some sort of apathy. Adults started pushing kids towards the front of the line. It was slow going. Some people complained about claustrophobia, or fear of spiders or snakes. They picked up the pace again, though, when the Pierce's started shooting their guns at the forest.

When almost half of the people were in the tunnel, including Carol, Tara, and Maggie, Carl noticed that others were missing. "Glenn, where's Daryl?" he shouted. "Where's my dad?"

Glenn grasped Carl's shoulder and leaned over so that he could make eye contact at eye-level. "They were taken out to the field. Once everyone else is in the tunnel, I'll go after them."

Carl paled. Landmines were still exploding in the distance. Rustles and growls from the south side of the woods preluded more Walkers. "I'll go with you," Carl said to Glenn. He stood up straight and stuck his chin out, expecting an argument. "I want to help!"

Glenn had his game face on. "Good," he said. He held Carl's eyes and nodded firmly. "I'm going to need your help." The Pierce family stopped firing at the ghosts in the woods and stood on the edge of the field staring, dumbfounded, at the smoke rising from the landmines and the herd of approaching Walkers drawn by the sound. One of the watchtowers collapsed like a tower of Jenga blocks. Glenn turned to the others. He cocked his shotgun by shaking it once up and down with one hand. "Listen up—"

Even with all the noise, somehow one gunshot stood out. It was meant for Glenn's head. It should've hit Glenn's head, but Abraham must have seen the sniper in the plantation house window because he stepped forward and accepted the bullet into his own body. It sliced his heart in two and his spine into pieces. He was gone – long gone – before he hit the ground. As one, Glenn, Carl, Tyreese, and Michonne pivoted towards the window and opened fire. Daryl's crossbow slid, unnoticed, off Carl's shoulder. Tyreese started sprinting towards the house. The others called him back, but he shouldered his way through the front door. Sasha heard the commotion and ran in after him.

Their shouts of fury combined with the automatic weapons fire drew the rest of the Pierce family's attention. One of the civilians – a middle-aged woman – was gunned down as she jogged towards the shed. "Cover them!" Glenn shouted, his voice more broken than whole. He winced as he stepped over Abraham's body. Focusing all his anger into his gun must have empowered it because he hit two Pierce-shaped silhouettes. Michonne and Carl stood on either side of him and laid down cover fire as the last group ran from the barn to the tunnel. The Matriarch and several others took shelter behind the stables.

Carl noticed that Michonne wasn't pointing her weapon in the right direction. "What are you doing?" he yelled at her.

Michonne's teeth rattled from her gun's intensity as she said, "I'm taking a page out of Carol's book." Half a moment later she hit the target.

The tractor closest to the stables (and its wagon) exploded sky-high. Three more wagons caught fire, and so did the stables. The Pierce family hightailed it back to the plantation house. "Dammit," Glenn cursed, worrying about Tyreese and Sasha. "All right, ok, all right… Everyone else is in the tunnel, so that leaves us three to find Rick and Daryl."

Carl reloaded his rifle and picked up the crossbow. "Let's go!" He started to run without checking to see if the others were following.

* * *

Rick pinned a Walker to the ground and pierced it so hard between the eyes that his hand ended up wrist-deep in its skull. He rolled to his right and tackled another whose teeth were inches from Daryl's throat. After he stabbed it, Rick half-stumbled, half-crawled back to the watchtower. Daryl used the stair railing to hoist himself up into a sitting position. A hack, a gagging sound, and he spat blood onto the grass. "Good news," he coughed, "only _one_ of my ribs is broken."

Rick pocketed the wet knife, cocked Jeremy's shotgun, and handed the Patriarch's revolver to Daryl. "Keep the bad news to yourself," he said. He crouched on Daryl's right and aimed the weapon.

Daryl patted Rick on the back. "Your elbow's bleedin', brother."

"Not as bad as your head." Rick shielded his eyes against the new morning sunlight and squinted. "The fog and smoke are starting to clear up. In a few minutes we'll be able to see more than four feet ahead of ourselves."

"Which means the Herders'll see us." Daryl attempted a deep breath but the pain of his inflating lungs pressing against his rib was too excruciating. "They won't…. be thrilled to see… their boys dead…" Daryl managed to say.

Rick scanned the horizon through the shotgun's sight. "Can I ask you something?"

"Ain't in the mood for 'Twenty Questions," Daryl grunted. "Hated playing that with Merle. He always picked some part of the female anatomy."

A Walker wandered towards them and Rick shot it right through the ear. The shotgun made a _chachick_ sound when he cocked it. "It wouldn't be formal or legal or anything, but I'm thinking about asking Michonne to be Carl's godmother. Think she'd be ok with that?"

Daryl was busy trying to stop the blood flowing from the reopened wound on the back of his head. "Godmother. What, like, in fairy tales?"

Two bullets, two more dead Walkers. Rick stood up to get a better view. "Regular godmother. Not a fairy godmother. Carl isn't Cinderella."

"That story always bugged the hell outta me," Daryl said. "The cinder-chick isn't motivated to escape that hellhole until she meets some douchebag prince?" Daryl took his handkerchief away from his hair and frowned at how red it was. "Girl's gotta wanna be free for herself, you know? Not to hook up. Not for some party. For herself." Daryl pocketed the handkerchief and the revolver and grabbed onto the railing with both hands.

Rick scooted closer. He let Daryl struggle to stand for a whole half-minute before he lent a helping hand. "I want Carl to have a godparent in case I – for when I die." Rick cleared his throat. "Somebody I know and trust to take care of him. I know you all would help but it's good to have someone committed. Someone to help him with his science projects." Rick chuckled at his own joke.

"People do that who ain't in fairy tales?"

"Yeah, Daryl."

Daryl shrugged. "She was a mom. I bet she was good at it. She cares for the kid. She'd raise Carl right. Teach him important life lessons like what beer to drink and how to use a samurai sword." Daryl let go of the railing, finally, and stood firmly on his feet. He cocked the revolver and held it firmly, too.

Rick turned his back on Daryl as he pivoted around, on the lookout. "I want you to be Judith's. I want you to be Judith's godfather."

"Uh…" Words failed Daryl. "You – you want me to raise your kid? Rick, I didn't even finish high school."

"I want her to learn important life lessons like how to cook a squirrel and use a crossbow."

Daryl started to scratch his right arm furiously. "I don't know, man… We're family. You know if anything happened to you we'd all take care of your kids. Tyreese would breastfeed Lil' Asskicker if he could."

Rick snorted. "Thanks for that image." A fourth Walker ambled out of the fog. It must have had a near-miss with a landmine because the clothes on the left side of its body had burned off. Because it was limping, and extra-slow, Rick waited for it to get within arm's reach, and then he used the knife. "I know the group would care for Judy, but she needs a father. A clear role model. Someone to call 'Dad.'"

Daryl's nose scrunched up not unlike a squirrel's. "Would she have to call me 'Dad'? Couldn't she just call me by my name – or better yet: Big Asskicker?"

Rick rolled his eyes, but the curl of his lips betrayed his amusement. "Hypothetically, you can have her call you whatever you want."

"Do I have to sign something?" Daryl clamped his front teeth around a fingernail and chewed. "Do we do a blood oath or something?"

"Just shake on it, Daryl. Just shake on it."

Daryl spat the first fingernail aside and started chomping on the next one. "Rick, my household growing up wasn't the best. My mom basically killed herself when I was a kid, Merle was always in jail, my dad was a drunk and he…" Daryl's mouth went dry, even of blood, but he took a long second to spit at the ground anyway. "He… he…"

Without looking, Rick reached his hand back and gripped Daryl's shoulder. "I know," he said quietly. "After Andrea shot you at the farm, I was helping Hershel clean your wounds and I saw the scars on your back, Daryl. I saw them."

A quiet minute passed before they spoke again. "What if I turn out like my pops?" Daryl shuddered. "All I know about being a dad is what I learned from watching him and, well, you, now that I think about it. But I'm so much like Merle already and he was just like my dad…"

Rick pivoted all the way around. "When I first me you, yeah. But the only thing similar between you and your brother now, Daryl, is that you're the toughest SOB around. No way would I be on my feet with a fractured skull. Look at you. Look at you, man."

Daryl's cheeks flushed red for half a second. "I'll give it a shot. Lil' Asskicker and I will make you proud." Daryl spat on his palm and held it out to Rick. "Shake on it."

Right then, before their hands could touch, a dozen Walkers attacked.

* * *

Carl heard human grunts amongst the Walker growls. He picked up speed – as much speed as he could tiptoeing around landmines. Michonne was on his heels and Glenn was on hers. Around them the combination of morning fog and smoke from the explosions started to dissipate. The scene ahead appeared like magic. " _Dad_!" Carl screamed at the sight of so many Walkers surrounding Rick. Two empty guns sat useless on the grass and Rick and Daryl were fighting with one knife between them. " _Daryl, catch_!" Carl yelled, and he threw the crossbow over the crowd like a javelin. The archer jumped into the air, and Carl saw him catch the weapon before he was enveloped by the mob. War cries erupted from Michonne and Glenn and they dove into the herd. Carl sprinted halfway up the stairs of the last standing watchtower and sniped Walkers with his rifle.

Glenn muscled his way to Rick and tossed him a shotgun. The two men stood back-to-back and laid down enough cover fire to allow Michonne to make her way to Daryl. He was on his back, propped up on one elbow, and firing bolts as fast as he threw punches. Michonne sliced the remaining Walkers – three in one mighty baseball-bat-swing of her sword – and yanked Daryl to his feet. Rick and Glenn joined them at the watchtower. When his dad was within arm's reach, Carl jumped off the stairs and into a tight hug. "Oh, god, are you all right?" Rick asked, examining his son for any injuries. "Are you all ok? Where's everybody else?"

"Safe," Glenn was happy to announce. "Carl found a tunnel that led them into the woods."

"Way to go, kid," Daryl grunted. He patted his crossbow and nodded a thank-you at the boy.

Michonne was ripping arrows out of Walker skulls and wiping them clean on the grass. "We have to go back for Tyreese and Sasha," she reminded them. "They're in the house. The plantation house."

"Maybe they got out already," Glenn wondered. "They might be in the tunnel by now."

Michonne held out the bushel of arrows. To her surprise – to everyone's surprise – Daryl shook his head and handed the crossbow over for her to load them. He leaned heavily against the watchtower railing and rubbed his eyes with a dirty thumb and forefinger. "We'll go back for them," Rick agreed, "after we get the wounded somewhere safe." Although he didn't say Daryl's name, the others knew that Rick was talking about him when he rushed to Daryl's side and pulled his arm across his shoulders. "We have to check on Eugene, Gabriel and Judy, too."

Glenn and Michonne exchanged glances. "We'll get you three to the tunnel and go get them ourselves," Michonne said in a tone that left zero room for argument. "It might already be too late to—"

A metal object that looked like some alien crossover between a pineapple and a pinecone sailed past the watchtower, bounced off some random Walker's noggin, and exploded when it hit the ground. A third grenade followed a second one in quick succession. When the Grimes group turned to see who was throwing them, they saw the remaining mobile Pierce family members chucking them from beside the chicken coop. Cut off from the house, and cut off from the tunnel, they all started running in the opposite direction – across the field, towards the tree line. A hundred yards of landmines to go.

They only made it as far as the creek bed bridge when Daryl's knees buckled. Glenn doubled back to help. "Keep going!" Rick ordered Carl and Michonne. "The camp is due south. We're right behind you!" Rick and Glenn divided the weight between them, and they trudged forward with very little help from the wounded archer.

"Rick," Daryl wheezed. A grenade fell into the creek bed and blew Walker bits into the sky. "Rick, I can't… I can't…"

"Shut up," Rick ordered. He coughed into his sleeve and repeated, in a gentler but shakier voice, "Shut up, Daryl."

Daryl groaned as the rough ride aggravated his broken rib. His breaths shorted and sharpened. "Rick, I think… rib punctured… lung…"

Ice crept up Rick's spine, and then dragged his stomach down to his heels. A collapsed lung was as much of a death sentence as a Walker bite. "Just… Just keep going," was all he could think to say.

"Rick," Daryl whispered, "stop – wait, just a minute… just a minute." Daryl summoned the strength to dig his heels into the dirt. Keeping his grip on Rick, he unraveled his right arm from Glenn, spit into his palm and held his hand out. "Shake on it."

Emotions clogged Rick's head. "Daryl, we have to keep moving. Thirty yards to go."

"I want to… die as… Lil' Asskicker's godfather…" Daryl wheezed.

"You won't—!"

" _Rick_."

Rick glared at his friend. "You keep going," he ordered through clenched teeth. "You stay conscious and you keep moving, and then I'll shake your hand." Some hybrid between love and rage surged through Rick and he pulled Daryl's forehead against his own. "Please keep going," he whispered.

A shriek in the woods. Michonne or Carl – they couldn't tell. Glenn looked, wide-eyed, at Rick. " _Go_!" Rick pleaded. Glenn took off at a sprint with Rick and Daryl limping in his wake.

Rick almost dropped Daryl when they reached the camp. The scene awaiting them seemed to psychologically amputate his limbs.

It wasn't the sight of Eugene lying beside his homemade catapult with half a dozen bullet holes in his body.

It wasn't the sight of Father Gabriel's body chewed up by Walkers that Michonne just beheaded.

It was Carl kneeling beside an empty wicker basket.

Judith was gone.

Daryl sensed a sob brewing in Rick's body. With his arm around the officer's shoulders he felt the subtle quaking of muscle and the shuddering of joints. Skin paled with shock, then flushed red with emotion, then turned white in the absence of oxygen. With a start, Daryl realized that Rick hadn't breathed in nearly two minutes. Daryl didn't know how to help, so he defaulted to some sort of basic instinct and punched Rick's back between the shoulder blades. Air, spit, snot, half-digested oatmeal and tears simultaneously exploded from Rick, and he slumped forward to his knees. The noise that followed was a wordless two-syllable sob so loud that it made Daryl's ears ring as if a landmine exploded nearby.

Daryl kept a hand on Rick's shoulder until Carl dove into his dad's arms. Then he backed up, waved aside Michonne and Glenn's helpful hands, and leaned against a tree with his arms around his chest like a bandage. To suppress his own emotions, Daryl's tracker eyes examined the camp. He identified the Walker tracks easily enough. The current group's footprints were the freshest, followed by Eugene and Gabriel's cumbersome steps. Anger at the priest momentarily blinded Daryl. He was supposed to protect Judith! Anger at himself followed almost immediately. If only he'd taken the time to train Gabriel, to equip him… Daryl's already short breaths were halved, and the pain of his broken rib shifted from sharp to piercing to searing. He pressed his forehead against the tree and shut his eyes.

Daryl assumed that the cooing sound in the background was a bird looking for breakfast. His brain began to sort through hundreds of birdsongs in an automatic attempt to identify the species. When he couldn't, he did a push-up against the tree, righted himself and looked around the camp for the source. Michonne and Glenn were silently gathering up what supplies were still intact. The bundle of trembling limbs that was Rick and Carl wouldn't be moving anytime soon. Daryl tiptoed between them and the smoking campfire ashes towards the coos. He found the tree ten yards south of Eugene's slingshot. A dead tree with sagging branches and more than one hole scraped out of the hollow trunk. Daryl inhaled deeply through his nose. Squirrel nests. Unoccupied, but still reeking. One hole about six and a half feet up the trunk once housed an owl. Daryl could smell the moldy, mothy scent of coughed up rodent remains. Another coo caught his attention. It was coming from the owl nest. Nature had created an oval-shaped hole almost three feet tall and two wide…

Tracks. Tracks right at the foot of the tree. Gabriel stood right where Daryl was now – stood on his tiptoes facing the tree. Why…?

Another coo. Puzzle pieces fit together in Daryl's mind.

"Glenn!" Daryl called. The breath needed to yell was barely available from Daryl's collapsing lung. "M-Michonne!" He couldn't catch enough breath to continue speaking when they ran over, so he just pointed at the tree, pointed at the hole, and mimed Gabriel lifting something over his head and dropping it into the owl nest.

Michonne got the message before Glenn did, because she gasped, "Oh my god," and stood on her tiptoes, trying to reach into the nest. "Help me," she barked at Glenn. "Give me a leg up!" Glenn laced his fingers together, palms up, and held them steady as Michonne braced one foot against them and jumped. Relief hit Daryl like a snowball down his shirt when she got her chin over the lip of the hole and gasped Judith's name.

Flurries of motion so fast that Daryl couldn't keep track of who was who. Mouths spoke, and bodies climbed. And then a minute later – or maybe five – a grinning, but still teary-eyed Rick pulled Daryl's face against his chest in the closest hug he could give without hurting the other man. His forehead against Rick's sternum put Daryl's nose directly above Judith's, who huddled, cooing and unharmed, in her dad's arms. One tear – only one – slid off Daryl's nose and splashed against Judith's. She froze briefly, shocked by the sensation, nostrils twitching like a rabbit's, fingers clawing at her face… But then she grinned, and giggled, and the sound warmed Daryl's heart like nothing else ever could.

"That's my Lil' Ass-kicker," Daryl whispered. "You're a survivor, sweetheart."

When they had everything worth carrying, the group followed Carl to the tunnel opening. They expected to find their friends waiting for them there. Maggie, Carol, and the rest, and maybe a few of the other survivors of the Herders.

They found nobody. The clearing was empty. Smoke poured out of the tunnel and they smelled gas. The Pierce's were cleansing the tunnel like a rabbit warren. Glenn asked the question that everyone was thinking: "Where would Maggie and the others go?"

"That way," Carl said with confidence as he pointed south. He saw the adults exchanging glances and spoke again before they could doubt him. "I left a sign for them. For all of them." He led them to the nearest tree marked with the circled "x" carved into it. Sure enough, there was a white pillowcase nailed to the bark with a message written in mud in Carl's handwriting, and an arrow pointing at the symbol:

 **STAY TOGETHER – FOLLOW THIS SOUTH**

Michonne, Glenn, Carl, and Daryl stared at Rick. He nodded back. "Let's find our people," he declared, and the group started following the symbols – and the dozens of pairs of footprints – south.

* * *

A bird's eye view of the Towers of Eden after the end of the world: In the Georgia woods eight miles south of the Pierce Plantation, surrounded by a rushing ten-foot-deep river, on a patch of dusty dirt that refused to sprout grass, three apartment complexes stood in a triangular setup around a dry swimming pool. Each tower wore a colored "Now Leasing!" banner that faced the one remaining bridge over the river. The ten-story tower on the left had a green banner. The twenty-story tower on the right had a blue one. The one in the middle, towering at thirty-stories, had the red banner. Gardens flanked the cobblestone sidewalk that led from the bridge to the pool that had been converted into a pen. Pigs, ducks, rabbits, a raccoon, one deer and two possums were getting fatter by the day living in that pool and eating the scraps that people threw out the windows. Almost four hundred people lived in the Towers of Eden. They drank from the river and ate from the garden. The one or two Walkers that managed to cross the bridge (instead of getting swept away by the water), were no threat to anyone in the upper floors. It was a fortress. The apartment complexes were castles and the river was their moat.

Rick Grimes was deep in thought about the image of a castle when Daryl stirred. Relief trickled down his veins like ice water. Daryl had been unconscious for almost a day and Rick had started to worry that he might never wake up. But he did, and like a Dixon would when finding himself in an unfamiliar place, he woke up swinging, and bashed his left fist against the upended bulldozer protecting him from the setting sun. Daryl cursed, then cursed again when he tried to sit up. Rick got to him before he tried to roll over onto his cracked rib. "Don't move," he urged. "Daryl, you'll just hurt yourself. Don't move."

"…the hell?" Daryl grunted. He looked down at his unbuttoned shirt, then past it at the swollen black bruise on his chest the size of his hand. "What happened? Rick, where are we?"

"You fainted."

"I'm not a chick, Rick. I don't _faint_."

"You passed out," Rick huffed. "We were hiking and then you just…" Rick mimed a falling body with his hand.

Daryl grabbed the front of his friend's shirt and held on like it was a cliff face. "Judith… Carl… Everybody ok? Did we catch up with Carol?"

"First things first. Open up," Rick said softly. Daryl tilted his head up as a bottle of water descended to his lips. He didn't know how thirsty he was until that first sip. When the water was gone he looked expectedly at Rick. "Think you can sit up?" Rick asked.

Daryl winced at the thought, then nodded. He started to argue when Rick gripped his upper arm, but his breaths were so short and sharp that he didn't want to waste them. He allowed Rick to hoist him up and then scoot him back so that he rested against the bulldozer. The scene came into focus. Scattered around them, huddled in groups of five to ten, were the Herders survivors – the 70 or so that decided to stick with their group. Carl and Antonio were playing Go Fish with a raggedy deck of cards. Glenn was changing Judith's diaper, and getting yelled at for doing it wrong by three older women. The edge of the woods squatted twenty yards to their left. Ten yards to their right was a ten-foot rickety wooden bridge over a deep rushing river. Michonne stood on their side of the bridge, glaring at three armed men standing guard on the opposite shore. Daryl squinted as he studied their clothing. Each man wore a patch on his left hip. The first sported a blue "3," the second a red "18" and the third a green "7."

"We caught up with everybody?" Daryl confirmed. His spirts rose when Rick nodded. "Carol's here?"

Rick tried to hide a wince. "I saw her," he said. "I spoke to her. Maggie, too. Tara, Rosita… Abraham's dead. No sign of Tyreese and Sasha. They might still be on the plantation…" Rick rubbed his eyes with one knuckle. His sigh sounded like a groan and he avoided Daryl's eyes.

Daryl sensed the lie of omission. It was probably for his own good, knowing Rick, but this was no time for lies of any sort. "Rick, what's going on? Where's Carol?"

Rick pointed at the apartment towers beyond the bridge. "She's in there. She's one of our ambassadors."

Surprised, Daryl said, "You didn't go with them?"

"Couldn't." Rick pursed his lips together. "That's the strangest thing we've encountered here… They insisted that four women go. Just women."

Four faces lined up in Daryl's mind. "Maggie, Carol, Tara, and Rosita?" he said quietly.

"Yeah." Rick shifted his weight.

A whistle across the camp. Michonne was pointing at the Green Tower. "They're coming back," Michonne said. She blocked the sun out of her eyes. "Wait, no, there's just two. That's just Rosita and Tara."

Rosita and Tara's escorts dropped them off at the bridge, and the guards waved them across. Both girls looked pale – especially Rosita, who was undoubtedly grieving Abraham. They made a beeline for Rick. Carl and Glenn ran over, as did a dozen of the other survivors.

"Where's Maggie?" Glenn asked. "She didn't come back with you?"

"Where's Carol?" Daryl grunted.

The two women exchanged glances. Rosita wiped her nose and nodded at Tara with pleading eyes. Tara rubbed her left arm and then stuffed her fists into her pockets. "Do you, uh, do you guys want the good news first or the bad news?"

"Good," Carl said. The setting sun's rays were in his eyes and he pulled his dad's hat down low.

Tara looked relieved. She stood on her tiptoes so that the entire group could hear her. "We can stay. All of us. They're letting us in!" Sighs of relief around them. A few people hugged and several more clapped. Tara's shoulders visibly relaxed. She gave the crowd a shy wave. "There's more, there's more good news." Her eyes landed on Daryl. "There's a doctor. A surgeon."

Rick clapped his hand against his mouth and closed his eyes. He sat against the bulldozer beside Daryl, who could feel his body trembling with relief. Daryl sensed that the other shoe was about to drop. "What's the catch?" he asked, his strained voice barely audible. "Let me guess: no anesthetic?" Rick silently put his hand on Daryl's shoulder.

Tara's smile deflated. She adopted a child's hand-caught-in-the-cookie-jar expression. "These people are, uh... traders. That's T-R-A-D-E-R-S, not T-R-A-I-T—"

"Tara," Michonne urged.

"They trade," Tara said. "That's how they run this place. If you want something you have to trade it for something else."

Rosita spoke up. "We asked them for two things: surgery for Daryl, and to allow us to join their group. We had to trade two things for that."

Daryl considered what little he knew about the hospital where Beth and Carol were held. "So, they let us in and we do chores to pay the rent? Clean their socks and share our squirrels?"

Tara's eyes landed on her shoes and stayed there. "That's – that's what I hoped they meant when they said a trade. But it – it wasn't…"

Glenn turned red. " _Tara_ …"

"Just spit it out," Rosita encouraged with a sniffle.

Tara took a deep breath. "The council here – they have slaves. They use slaves. If you want to join their group, you have to – to give them a slave…"

Daryl was speechless. His head was screaming but no words came out. Glenn looked sick. His hands started to tremble, and he handed Judith off to Carl before he put her in danger. "You mean…"

"They volunteered," Rosita squeaked. "Both of them. The second that The Surgeon hinted about what he wanted in return for helping Daryl, Maggie and Carol raised their hands." Both women looked at Glenn. "I'm so sorry…"

"So, what – what does that mean?" Glenn asked. He wrung his hands together so fiercely that his thumb scraped his palm. "We – we don't get to see them? They have to wash the council's dishes? Babysit? Laundry? _What_?" Glenn's hands gripped his black hair like vices. " _What will they make her do_?"

Tara and Rosita both jumped. "We're not sure," Tara whispered. "We're… we're just not sure."

Glenn sounded as out of breath as Daryl did. "Those sick bastards. That's why they only wanted to negotiate with women," he gasped. He didn't notice that Rick got to his feet and snuck up behind him. "We have to get them back – maybe I can trade places with her – maybe she's sneaking out right now – maybe we should go in after her – maybe – maybe they're forcing her right now-!" Glenn took his gun out of his holster and pivoted. Fire was in his eyes as he started to sprint for the bridge.

Rick was ready. He grabbed Glenn around the waist and dug his boots into the dirt. "Michonne!" he grunted when Glenn elbowed him in the jaw. "Glenn, stop – stop! You're going to get yourself killed!"

"Let me go!" Glenn howled. "Maggie – _Maggie_!"

Michonne joined the scuffle and together she and Rick forced Glenn to the ground and took his weapon. When Michonne pointed out that his actions were likely to get Maggie hurt, he finally started to calm down. A befuddled silence settled on the seventy members of the Grimes group. That's when Daryl spoke.

"Tara, let's say you go back in there and you tell those assholes that they can shove that…" Daryl huffed in frustration. His remaining working lung couldn't handle long sentences. "What happens if… you tell them… no?"

"We asked about that," Rosita said quickly. "They're free to go. We're all free to go. They said it's our choice. No strings attached."

"Yeah, right," Carl muttered.

Daryl nodded. "That's our answer. That's our answer 'cuz… there's no way in hell I'm…. letting Maggie or Carol… take the fall for me." Daryl's trembling fingers clinched the fabric above his chest.

Rick returned to Daryl's side. "A doctor, Daryl. They have a doctor! There's zero guarantee we'll find another one… ever!"

"Don't care," Daryl rasped. A cough started but he shoved it back down his throat.

Tears blurred Rick's eyes. "Daryl, you'll—"

"Don't… _care_!"

" _You'll die_!" Rick took Daryl by both shoulders and he was impressed by his friend's strength when Daryl returned the gesture.

" _I want to die_!" Daryl shouted, doubling the volume of his voice. "If the choice is between me dying and Maggie n' Carol being slaves to five dicks then dammit, Rick, _I'd rather die_!" Rick's ears experienced whiplash when Daryl's voice descended to a whisper. "Let me go," Daryl begged. "Please, _just let me go_ …"

Before Rick could respond, or even notice that Daryl managed a whole paragraph, a violent shudder scurried through the archer's body. His eyes widened. He coughed once, twice, and then went into a wheezing fit. " _No_!" Rick wailed when blood splattered across his lap. The coughs sounded like an avalanche and the blood kept coming as Daryl's body jolted and jerked. Daryl slumped against Rick, but his eyes were on Judith dozing in Carl's arms. He couldn't make the words so he mouthed them at Rick: SHAKE ON IT. A dry sob erupted from Rick's nose when Daryl grabbed his hand. He squeezed back, shook it gently, and finally sealed Daryl's status as his daughter's godfather.

And then the coughs stopped as quickly as they started. Either Daryl wasn't trying to inhale anymore, or he couldn't. He was as limp in Rick's arms as Carl had been when he was shot. Limp except for his head, which was cradled against Rick's heart like an infant. Daryl shook his head back and forth, and back and forth again. Rick didn't need to hear the message to receive it. _Don't do it_ , Daryl was saying. _Don't do it, don't do it, don't do it_ …

Rick cupped Daryl's cheek in his blood-soaked palm and focused all his love into Daryl's eyes. When they closed, Rick buried his nose against Daryl's neck.

 **ONE WEEK LATER**

At dawn, Rick Grimes was sitting on the ground with his head in his hands. He was so lost in deep thought that he didn't hear Maggie's approach. She set a bottle of water down in front of him, watched to see if he'd react, then she sat on his right side, looped her arm around his elbow and leaned her cheek against his shoulder. "I miss him, too," she whispered. "But he wouldn't want you to be like this."

She felt rather than heard Rick's deep, craggy inhale. "No, no he wouldn't. He'd call me a dumbass. What I wouldn't give to hear him call me a dumbass…" Rick rubbed his eyes with dirty fingers. "How's Carol?" he asked.

"She's adjusting. Keeping busy with laundry." Rick rubbed his hands down his unshaven face and leaned his head back against the squat brick building behind them. "I woke up this morning," Maggie said, "and realized that I never thanked you."

Rick snorted. "For what?"

"I know that was a hard decision for you, Rick. Most of the group thinks it was the right one. That includes me."

"Glenn won't talk to me. Won't even look at me."

"You let me handle him." Maggie squeezed Rick's elbow. "It's ok, Rick. Everything will work out ok."

Another snort. "He'll be so pissed at me when he wakes up."

"What's important is that he _will_ be waking up."

Snort number three. " _If_ he wakes up…" Maggie lifted her head and met Rick's eyes. "The doc says his blood pressure is back to normal and the incisions are healing well. There's a slight fever but no infection. His lung is better, his rib is healing, and all of the internal bleeding has stopped. It's like… it's like he's comatose just to spite me."

Maggie chuckled at that. "He's punishing you for saving his life?"

"He's punishing me for – for _using_ you and Carol."

"Dammit, Rick, do we have to have this conversation again?" Maggie untangled her arm and pivoted in her seat to face him. "For the last time, it was my choice! Daryl's life is worth it. I'd do it again for any of you."

"You're a _slave_ , Maggie!"

Maggie fumed. It she was a cartoon character, smoke would burst from her ears. "Helper, Rick. _Helper_. For God's sake, Tara used that word, not me, and now you won't let it go." She held up her wrists and pointed to her ankles. "Do you see any chains? Do you see any bruises? Have you heard me complain even once about the chores I have to do? I'm not a slave, I'm not a servant. I'm just paying off a debt with the only currency this place recognizes." Rick didn't look admonished enough, so she kept going. "I'll tell you the same thing that I tell Glenn every night. I volunteered to be one of the council's helpers. As a helper my duties are to prepare their food, deliver their messages, do their laundry, and anything else they need and – _no_ – Rick, that does _not_ include any – any sexual favors—"

Rick held his palms up in surrender. "Maggie, I hear you. We just assumed the worst when—"

"Well, stop assuming and start listening! We're adult women fully capable of making our own decisions. If Carol and I were being forced to do something we didn't want to, we'd tell you. It's a fair deal, Rick, it really is. Carol and I are happy to feed the pigs and weed the gardens so that all of us can live here safely."

Rick gave her a long, scrutinizing look. He shifted so that he could stare her straight in the eyes. "Swear to me," he whispered. "Swear to me that you and Carol are ok. Swear on something important."

Maggie cocked her chin in the air. "I swear on my father's soul," she declared. Maggie scooted the bottle of water closer to him. "Now take care of yourself so that you can take care of Daryl." Without another word, Maggie sprang to her feet and marched away.

Carol was waiting for her in the rear of the Red Tower. Clotheslines stretched from the first story windows to the trees, and Carol was busy taking down the laundry that dried overnight. When she saw Maggie's approach, Carol set the plastic laundry basket aside and went to meet her. "Any change?" she asked, her voice sounding as pale as her face looked.

Maggie shook her head. "Daryl's still unconscious. Rick's still suspicious. Carol, I…" The younger woman ran her fingers through her hair. She kept a tight grip on the ends like they were the last straws on the camel's back. "I can keep a straight face around Rick and the others but Glenn… He sees right through me. Carol, I think he knows I'm lying."

Carol stepped forward and gripped Maggie's wrists. "Then you must tell better lies," she ordered with a soft ferocity. "If he knew – Maggie, he'd go crazy, you know that, and he'd get himself killed. And if this goes to hell, they'll kill Daryl." Maggie nodded. She bit her lower lip and her eyes flickered between the ground and the sky, avoiding Carol's. Gently, with a mother's touch, Carol cupped Maggie's chin in her hand and forced their eyes to meet. "You and I have to be strong," she said. "Maybe after Daryl's all better and we've figured out how many weapons there are around here we can reconsider our options but until then… Maggie, we have to be strong for the people we love."

Maggie nodded. She wiped her tears away, drew a steadying breath, and took a pair of jeans off the clothesline.

* * *

Instinct tickled Michonne's nose. She unsheathed her katana and took a fighting stance in front of the metal door. The pump house for the Eden swimming pool was as young as the rest of the complex, but the hinges had rusted from a lack of maintenance. They squirmed and squeaked as they opened. Michonne sighed with relief when Rick entered the small room. "I thought you were going to get some sleep."

Rick shrugged with his lips and eyebrows, but not his shoulders. "I just spoke to Maggie."

Michonne put her sword away. She sat down on a yellow milk crate and folded her hands in her lap. "How is she?"

Rick scratched the back of his head and pulled up a crate across from her. "She's hiding something. I know she is."

Michonne tilted her head to the left. "Sure you're not just being paranoid?" She held up her hands in surrender at the look on Rick's face. "I'm just wondering."

Rick rubbed his thumb across a grass stain on his gray t-shirt. "Did you add another five milligrams to his drip?"

"Ten minutes ago. I'll let you handle the catheter." Michonne reached across the mattress between them and tucked the white bed sheet tighter under Daryl's right arm. "I think he started dreaming while you were gone. He said Beth's name."

Rick's frown lessened slightly. He pressed the back of his hand against Daryl's pale cheek. "He smells funny."

"He smells _clean_." Michonne snorted. "We should burn his clothes. Burn them then bury them then fill the hole with cement."

Rick chuckled deep in his gut, mute. "We definitely gotta find him some new socks. They fell apart when I took them off him."

"Anyone who helped bathe him should probably be quarantined!" Rick laughed out loud at that. "And I've been thinking… While he's asleep, let's cut his hair." Michonne patted her sword and grinned.

Rick shook his head but kept his smile. "Oh, no. If I was in his shoes, I'd want him to guard my beard."

"Shoes. We need to burn his shoes, too. Or throw them at Walkers. Might be lethal even for them."

Rick's smile brightened some more at the thought. "Did I ever tell you about the first time I met Daryl?"

Michonne busied herself with retying a blue bandanna around her dreadlocks. It was new, a gift from one of the original Edenites who didn't need it anymore when she transferred from the Blue Tower to the Red Tower. "Carl told me about the quarry and Andrea told me about the farm. Not a lot of details, though."

Rick leaned forward and braced his elbows against his knees. "Me and him didn't exactly get off on the right foot. He came back from hunting and there I was telling him I left his brother to die in Atlanta."

Michonne's nimble fingers froze in mid-knot. "You handcuffed Merle? I thought that was, uh… T-Dog?" Rick shook his head. "So, the first thing you said to Daryl when you met was that you pretty much killed his brother… He didn't try to kill you?"

One corner of Rick's mouth twitched. "Sort of. He, uh… He threw squirrels at me."

Two sharp cackles burst from Michonne's throat. "He attacked you with squirrels?" She slapped her knee. "Daryl Dixon, Walker-slayer, always armed with a crossbow, a gun, and a knife and he—" Michonne shook her head as her eyes watered from suppressed laughter.

Laughter felt foreign to Rick. It felt sore in his body, like a muscle he hadn't used in years. A good kind of sore – the type that reminds you that you worked hard. Rick and Michonne passed giggles between them like cigarettes for a full five minutes before they settled into a comfortable silence. After another five minutes, Rick scooted his milk crate aside and sat, Indian-style, at Daryl's right elbow. He gently peeled back the bed sheet to reveal his friend's bare chest. "He was a different man back then," Rick said quietly as he peeked under the bandages to check for infection. "Impatient, angry, short-tempered, unpredictable – a walking firecracker." Rick sighed. "I've changed, too. Daryl's become a better man but I've…" Rick shook his head and completed his thought at a whisper. "I'm not sure what kind of man I am anymore."

Michonne watched him carefully. The few rays of sunshine that snuck in through a pair of rectangular windows near the ceiling hit Rick's cheekbones at an angle that made him appear twice his age. He touched Daryl with the same gentle fingers he used with Judith – probing fresh skin that used to be black and blue, swiping a miniscule ball of lint aside with a pinky, folding the tail of a suture away from the needle on the inside of Daryl's elbow.

"Rick?"

"Yeah?" The officer put the bandages back in place. Gently he wiped his palm across Daryl's sweaty forehead and skimmed the top of his hair.

"I don't know what kind of man you are. I just know that you're a man I trust. That's all that matters to me. When you tell me something, I believe it."

Rick gave her a long look. Eventually his eyes focused on a pair of empty nets hanging on the wall behind her shoulder. "Do you believe Maggie and Carol?" he whispered.

Michonne's nostrils flared. "I want to," she said.

Rick nodded. "So do I," he whispered.

Then – right then – a dry, gruff voice mumbled, "Rick, am I naked?"

* * *

Maggie Greene took the stairs three at a time as she sprinted 30 stories up to the Red Tower penthouse. She was out of breath, and therefore thankful when the people inside took their time coming to the door. When it finally peeked open, a dozen series of knocks later, Maggie immediately shouted, " _Daryl's awake_!"

The petite Asian woman at the door clutched the fabric above her heart in surprise. "Maggie, keep it down! You know it's too early to disturb them!"

"I'm sorry, Penelope," Maggie gasped. She swallowed, trying to contain both her excitement and the sharp breaths in her chest. "Please, I need to speak to The Surgeon. It's urgent. My friend woke up and we need to know what to do."

Penelope's eyes went wide. She shook her head. "Oh, no. I'm not waking any of them up unless there's a whole pack of Chompers—"

"Who's there?" a deep voice asked. Penelope squeaked and retreated from the door. Maggie took a step backwards and wrapped her arms tight around her stomach. She had only been a helper at the Towers of Eden for a week, but she was already too familiar with The Surgeon's mood. Mood – not moods, plural. The man had one mood. One mood only and few degrees of it. The closet description that Maggie had for it was _cantankerous_. The door imploded open. Maggie held her ground as The Surgeon marched into the hallway wearing only a stained bathrobe. He was a white, heavyset man – far fatter than anyone had a right to be with so little food to go around. He had a salt-and-pepper beard and his face was hot-pepper-red, worse than its usual beet-red color. Although he had the look of a man who only communicated with sharp shouts and thunderous bellows, The Surgeon was actually quite soft-spoken.

Astonishingly soft spoken for such a violent man.

"Maggie," he said quietly, as if talking to a drowsy infant, "I am a civilized man, so I will let you choose your punishment. Unless you have my breakfast, you will either donate that lovely hair of yours to stuff my pillows, or you'll guard the Kennels all day – _alone_."

Maggie chose her words carefully. "I'm following your instructions. You asked me to tell you when Daryl Dixon woke up."

" _I also told you never to disturb me this early_ —"

"He's awake for the first time since the surgery. He seems all right but he's running a temperature. You need to go see him."

" _Do I_?" Maggie struggled to hold her composure when he stormed right up to her face. His bloated jowls quivered with rage. Maggie looked down and saw both of his hands flexing into fists. She doubted that she could explain away a bruise to Glenn this time…

A second man appeared in the doorway. Maggie recognized him from the council, a man she only knew as The Sheriff. All five council members shared the five-bedroom apartment. The penthouse was the safest, cleanest, most well-stocked apartment. Only the council members, their wives, and their helpers were ever allowed on the 30th floor of the Red Tower. That was the third rule that Maggie memorized when she and Carol volunteered.

"Pardon me," The Sheriff said, politely. The most courteous and least demanding of the bunch, The Sheriff was a middle-aged African American with deep wrinkles and kind, tired eyes. He sidestepped The Surgeon and held open a black bag between them. "I know he needs pain relievers and that his bandages will need redressed, but does he need any additional medications right now?"

The Surgeon didn't take his eyes off Maggie. "No," he said, his nostrils flaring like a bull about to charge. "I'll visit him when his stitches are ready to be removed." The Surgeon turned on his heel and slammed the door behind him, but not before hissing, "If I'm in the mood."

The Sheriff offered Maggie an apologetic smile. "The end of the world brings out the best in some people and the worst in others," he said. Maggie nodded and reached for the medicine bag. "I'll carry it," he said, tossing it over one shoulder. "I'm in the mood for an early morning walk anyway."

Tears dropped onto Maggie's cheeks before she even noticed that they were in her eyes. "Thank you."

Carol, Rosita, Tara, Glenn, Carl, Michonne, and Rick were all crowded into the pump house when Maggie and The Sheriff arrived. Daryl was awake and propped up against a milk crate covered by Rick's jacket. He took brief, shallow sips of water from a bottle in Rick's hand, pausing to take deep breaths between each drink. Maggie was taken aback when The Sheriff suddenly let go of the medicine bag. At the same time, Rick nearly dropped the water bottle, splashing the liquid across Daryl's chin before he caught it.

The Sheriff's jaw hung open. "Rick Grimes," he said slowly, enunciating each syllable.

Rick's Adam's apple bobbed in his throat. " _Morgan_?"

* * *

Rick and Morgan talked for three laps around the Towers of Eden. After deciding on a time to meet later, they shook hands and parted ways back at the pump house. Rick found Carol leaning against the outside wall with her arms crossed against her chest. "He's in a bad mood," she announced. "It's kinda my fault. I tried to feed him oatmeal by pretending the spoon was an airplane. Sophia was a picky eater," she explained. "He wasn't amused. Then he started asking questions. When I told him where we are he became… agitated."

Rick sighed. "I'll talk to him."

"Yes, you will," Carol said sternly. "I'll be back after I make The Judge his lunch." She walked off.

Rick had to duck when he opened the door and a bottle of water flew over his head. " _Son of a bitch_!" Daryl snarled. Rick wasn't sure if the archer was insulting him or just reacting to the pain in his chest undoubtedly doubled by the throw. Rick hurried to the mattress to help, but Daryl swatted his hand away like he was a Walker. "Dammit, Rick Grimes, if you were any other man I'd deck you!"

Rick held his palms up in surrender. "Let me explain."

"Let _me_ explain!" Daryl bellowed. He propped himself up on one elbow and then paused to catch his breath. "Here's my theory: right after I passed out, Tara said she and Rosita were just joking. Carol and Maggie came back – sound and safe or safe and sound or whatever – and then the only thing you had to give them for getting me surgery was a 'thank you.' You best hear me, Rick. If that ain't how it happened, then you and me got a problem."

Rick spoke extra slow, and extra soft. "You just saw Carol, right? She's fine. Maggie is, too. They just have to do a few more chores than the rest of us – that's all."

Daryl didn't take Rick's bait. His tone and volume stayed the same. "That ain't the point!" Daryl braced his other elbow beneath him and muscled his way up into a sitting position. The bed sheet covering his body slid down to his waist, but he didn't bother adjusting it. "I told ya – I _begged_ ya, Rick! I said I'd rather die, and I meant it!"

"I should've let you die so that Carol doesn't have to do extra laundry?"

" _That ain't the point_!" Daryl braced his hands against the mattress like he was about to try standing up. "Did you find out – _for sure_ – that Maggie and Carol would be all right _before_ you took me to that surgeon?"

"Of course not. I didn't see Carol and Maggie again until after you—" Rick realized that he had backed himself into a wall. A metaphorical wall so hard he could almost feel it against his spine. "I… I took a risk."

"You gambled with their lives!"

"I didn't have a choice!"

"I used what I thought were my last breaths to make the choice _so you wouldn't have to_!" Daryl yelled. He tried to stand but didn't get more than three inches off the mattress before he collapsed. Color flooded his face. He wrapped his arms around his torso as if he could protect it. "What if—" he sputtered, "what if those pricks wanted Carl instead, huh?" Rick appeared to turn into a statue, so Daryl kept going. "Maybe you're right. Maybe everything's fine. Or maybe they're being threatened? What if they're telling Carol that she has to do whatever they say, or they'll take away my antibiotics? What if they're telling Maggie that if she blabs about what's really going on, they'll shoot Glenn in the head?"

Rick chewed on his bottom lip as he gathered his thoughts. "I ain't saying those aren't good questions," he said slowly, "but let me ask you some." Rick knelt in front of Daryl. When the other man started to squirm, he pinned his wrists against his knees. "Put yourself in my shoes, Daryl. What would you do if it was Merle, huh? What would you do if the person lying in your arms, dying, was _Beth_?" Rick took a deep breath, stared at the cement floor beneath them, and then made eye contact again. "You weren't dying," he whispered. "You were _dead_." His voice cracked. He didn't even try to glue it back together. "I held you in my arms and _I felt your heart stop_." Daryl tried to look away and Rick cupped his cheek with a trembling hand. "I couldn't save Beth or Herschel or… or Lori… but I could save you – and I did – _and I don't regret it_."

Daryl went owl-eyed. Rick gave his wrists a last squeeze, and then he shuffled over and sat on the mattress on Daryl's right. Suddenly, Daryl whispered, "We burned a house down. Beth and me. It lit up fast. Like my mom's."

Rick cocked an eyebrow. "Why?"

"Don't remember," Daryl said. "Those first few days after the prison – when I thought ya'll were dead – I was just, _done_ , you know? I mean I was still running and fighting and all, but I wasn't living. I was just trying not to die."

Rick smiled at that. "I know what you mean."

"Beth got on my nerves. Annoyed the crap outta me. Asked me a bunch of dumbass questions. Got me thinking. Got me pissed. Got me… Got me right here" Daryl pointed at his heart. "When we burned that house I kept thinking it looked like a big ass candle on a birthday cake. I ain't ever had a birthday cake, but you're supposed to make a wish, right?"

Rick grimaced. Memories of his own childhood birthday parties flashed through his head. "Right."

"I don't believe in wishes. How could anybody these days? But I wished on that candle. I wished she'd be all right." Daryl shook his head sadly. "Guess what I'm trying to say is I might've made the same call you did if it was Beth."

Rick expected that admission to make him feel better. When it didn't, he just felt depressed.

Neither man heard the approaching footsteps, so both jumped when Carl barged in. "Dad!" Carl put his hands on his knees and tried to slow his breathing. "Outside – the guards…"

Rick got to his feet. "Walkers?"

"Remember that sign I left outside the tunnel? The Underground Railroad tunnel? We didn't take it down – we should've taken it down— it led them right to us."

"Carl?"

"The guards just found it nailed to the bridge. Must've been left there overnight. Tyreese's necklace is with it. It's covered in blood."

 **THREE DAYS LATER**

The last thing Daryl remembered was falling asleep after supper, alone in Rick's empty bed. He was dreaming. Something about being stuck at the bottom of a well while Beth's blood filled it until he could float safely to the top. When he opened his eyes, Carol was standing over the bed with a flashlight, wiping a cool cloth across his face and neck. She smiled at him. "You're all right. Carl got me when your fever spiked. We got it back down again."

"Are they home yet?" Daryl rasped.

"No," said a meek voice on his right. Daryl turned to see Maggie beside him. He stretched his neck and spotted Carl curled up at their feet like a dog.

"Get some rest," Carol said. "I have to get back to The Judge."

"Wait," Daryl whispered. He fought his way up into a sitting position. "Carol!" In the living room, clearly visible through the open bedroom door, Judith dozed peacefully in her crib and Antonio snored on the couch with his Atlanta Braves hat covering his face. Carol closed the front door gently behind her and was gone.

"I'll leave you alone, too," Maggie said, though she didn't move.

Daryl rubbed his eyes. Filling his lungs with deep breaths woke him up completely. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," Maggie said too quickly. "It's just so quiet without Glenn. I couldn't sleep alone in that big empty apartment." She swung her legs off the side of the bed. "I'm just being stupid..."

Daryl plucked the pillow out from under his head and tossed it to Maggie. He tried to give her his blanket, but she wouldn't accept it. "Daryl, I really shouldn't be bothering you. I'm three feet away from you and I can feel your fever."

Daryl ran his hand across the sweat on his upper lip. "It'll be gone by morning. You awake, too, kid?" Daryl grunted.

"Carl is sleeping," Carl mumbled. Daryl gently kicked him between the shoulder blades. Carl sighed, sat up, and wrapped his arms around his knees. "They should've been back by now."

Daryl yawned. "It's twelve miles to the plantation."

"And twelve miles back," Maggie said. Moonlight streaming through the window behind her gave her skin a ghostly tint. "Tyreese and Sasha might be hurt. That'll slow them down."

"They probably spent half a day watching the house."

"And another half day planning the rescue mission."

"I know, I know." Carl rested his chin on his knees and chewed on his lower lip. "But if I hadn't left that stupid note—"

"They still would've gone after Tyreese and Sasha," Maggie said. "Your dad wouldn't leave anybody behind."

"I led the Dead Herders here. I put everybody else in danger. What if they attack while my dad's gone? There are kids here!"

"Morgan says there's plenty of guns," Daryl reminded him. "These people can defend themselves."

"They shouldn't have to!" Carl glanced at Judith to make sure he hadn't disturbed her, then continued speaking at a lower volume. "Maybe we should just leave."

"The Pierce's would still come through this place looking for us," Maggie concluded. "We're safer here. All of us."

Carl sighed and repeated, "They should've been back by now…"

Daryl studied the boy. He shared a knowing look with Maggie, who nodded. Daryl patted the bed and said, "Come 'ere, kid."

Carl scowled, but he only hesitated a moment more before he crawled up the bed and lay on his back between Daryl and Maggie with his fingers laced behind his head. All three just lay there in a comfortable silence, staring at the light gracing the beige ceiling. All of a sudden, Carl rolled onto his stomach and buried his nose against Daryl's shoulder. He made no sound as a few tears pattered down. Not knowing what else to do, Daryl just held still and let Carl use him as a Kleenex. Maggie scooted closer and rubbed small circles against Carl's spine. His breathing evened out almost instantly. He was asleep before his tears dried. Maybe it was the human contact, the sense of security, or just the white noise of sleeping breaths, but Maggie passed out not long after. Daryl reached under the bed and wrapped his hand around his crossbow. He'd just fallen asleep when he heard footsteps in the hall.

Daryl listened as one pair of footsteps approaching the apartment turned into three. He pinched Carl's arm and swatted Maggie's shoulder. "What is it?" Maggie asked groggily.

"Is it my dad?" Carl muttered, also half-asleep.

"Something's up," Daryl whispered. "Stay here." Moving by moonlight, Daryl tiptoed across the living room and peeked through the peephole. He watched as two strange men joined a third, who was loading fat rounds into a shotgun.

"The Maggie chick ain't in her apartment," a tall, pale redhead with tattoo sleeves reported.

Stranger number two was clean-shaven and wore a suit jacket. "Merle's brother ain't in his." The man gestured at the Grimes' door with his gun. "They all must be holed up together in there."

"Good." Number three cocked his weapon. "Fish in a barrel, boys."

Quickly and quietly, Daryl scooped Judith out of her crib. He put his hand across Antonio's mouth to both wake him up and keep him quiet. "In the bedroom. Go." Daryl shoved Antonio inside and handed the baby to Maggie. Carl gave him his crossbow. Daryl broke into a sweat when he shouldered it. The pressure of his blue jeans against his stomach and the tightness of his black t-shirt caused his healing rib to feel tender, but lifting the weapon was excruciating. He just barely got it loaded when the men kicked in the front door. In a single fluid movement, Daryl shouldered the bedroom door shut and fired a bolt. It flew wide past the men's heads and into the black hallway. Instantly three shotguns were leveled at his face.

"That's him!" the redhead bellowed. "That's Merle's brother. I helped Martinez catch 'em when he was trying to escape."

"We all saw him in the arena, dumbass!" The third man was missing his two front teeth. The way his tongue flicked out through the gap made him look slightly psychotic as he grinned at Daryl.

The archer loaded another arrow and politely asked, "Can I help you fellas?"

Number Two smirked. "Heard you weren't on your feet yet, son."

"You heard wrong, _son_ ," Daryl spat back. "If you're from Woodbury I bet you've heard a lot of things wrong about us."

"Woodbury." The redhead took a step forward. "The good old days with The Governor. Checkers and picnics and as much water as we wanted. Fine women who loved any man who kept 'em safe. Utopia… 'til you assholes from that prison ruined it."

Sweat running down Daryl's face barely missed his eyes. "You been following us?"

"We were here first!" Number two growled. "Then we see you all moving into the Green Tower, haunting us like ghosts, come to ruin us again."

"We're just looking for a safe home like everybody else," Daryl said. "Ain't got nothing against you personally. You put Woodbury behind you, we'll put this little incident behind us and we can all live happily ever after as neighbors."

" _Bullshit_!" A bullet hit the hardwood floor between Daryl's feet. He didn't even flinch. "Here's what's gonna happen. We're gonna kill you and the woman – take care of you nice and quick while the mommies and daddies are out of the house. If the rest of your kin don't get the message and move along, they're next!"

"You best leave now, boys," Daryl said soft but strong. "The Sheriff here's a friend of ours. When he and his men come looking for whoever fired that shot, you'll be the ones being asked to move along."

The toothless man cackled. "We been here longer. We're upstanding citizens at Eden Towers. They're bound to believe us when we tell them some redneck piece of shit attacked—"

Daryl didn't wait any longer. " _Maggie go out the window_!" he yelled as he fired a bolt into the toothless man's jugular. He rolled under a gunshot and swung his crossbow against the redhead's knees like a baseball bat while grabbing the third man's shotgun at the same time. He had the upper hand – for less than a second. The two Woodburians tackled him, flung him against the wall, kicked him and started smashing him with the butts of their shotguns.

A boot slammed into Daryl's rib and he screamed.

* * *

It was Tara's idea to ride the Eden River back to the Towers. Half a mile east of the Pierce Plantation stood a small boathouse with three dusty, moldy canoes with plastic paddles sitting inside them. Two more slots for two more canoes were empty and dozens of fresh footprints were scattered in the mud surrounding the boathouse. If the Dead Herders traveled via the river after they abandoned the plantation to the Walkers, that explained why nobody found any footprints leading to the river where someone nailed Carl's sign to the bridge. That answer came with more questions, though. If the Dead Herders kept going south past the Towers of Eden, where were they now?

Rick found Tyreese and Sasha's bodies in the plantation house basement. He vomited when he discovered that the two African Americans had perished at the hands of the Pierce Family the same way some of their ancestors did. Rick couldn't count how many times their backs were whipped because they'd endured so many lashes that the skin was one big bloody gash. Rick hated himself for having to leave his friends' bodies behind. There were just too many Walkers.

It was almost dawn when the canoes floated into the moat that encircled the Towers of Eden. Rick, Michonne, and Tara were in one boat and Glenn and Rosita were in the other. The trip wasn't a total bust. Rosita managed to snatch a bag of potatoes and Glenn found some more weapons. Guards intercepted the group at the bridge and let them on the grounds once they showed off their Green Tower patches. Half of what they salvaged was turned over to the guards to deliver to the council of Eden. That was the price for letting Rick and the others leave. Considering what they asked for last time Rick needed a favor, a few potatoes was hardly a sacrifice. The group marched from the bridge to the Green Tower in silence. None of them were looking forward to telling Carol, Carl, Maggie, and Daryl that more of their friends were dead. The Death Herders killed Abraham, Eugene, Gabriel, and then Sasha and Tyreese. But that – all of that – was put on the proverbial back burner when they entered the Green Tower.

The first-floor hallway was a circus. Familiar faces of their fellow Death Herders survivors crowded around the Grimes apartment. Guards that worked for the council tried to shepherd them aside. Hasty conversations in whispering voices stopped in mid-sentence when Rick walked through the door. A whole crowd of wide eyes parting to let him pass made the hairs on the back of Rick's neck stand on end. He ran. He ran down the hall and burst through the apartment door. He expected the worst, though what "the worst" was, he couldn't name.

The living room walls were Swiss cheese from so many bullet holes. Half a dozen council guards were mopping up blood and examining weapons. Rick counted three bodies on the floor, all covered from head to toe in white bed sheets. It was a crime scene. His new apartment was a crime scene. And his son and daughter were nowhere to be found…

Glenn jogged in. "Maggie isn't in our place – is she here?"

"She… I…" Rick stammered. He looked to the guards for explanation and got blank faces.

"Mr. Grimes?" a meek voice called. Rick pivoted and saw Antonio peeking through the master bedroom door. Nose running, body trembling, Antonio wiped salty tears against his sleeve and stepped into the room.

Judy was in his arms. Rick could smell her dirty diaper and tell by her grunts and sobs that she was hungry, but she was ok. He wrapped his arms around them both and demanded, "What happened? Where's Carl?"

"Rick!" a familiar voice called. Morgan came out of the kitchen. He looked the part of a town sheriff, not in the way he dressed but by his posture and presence. The guards moved aside respectfully as the councilmember walked over to Rick, stepping over the bodies like they were nothing but rogue shoes. "You're back. Good. We need to talk."

"What happened?" Rick repeated. "Where are Carl and Daryl?"

Morgan looked sadly at the nearest dead body and dread hit Rick so hard that he felt dizzy. "I'm afraid…" Morgan cleared his voice and put a hand on Rick's shoulder. "It's not clear exactly what happened, but Carl and your friend murdered three men. I'm afraid I was forced to arrest them both."

Rick felt like the ceiling was leaking ice water. The sensation of cold started at the crown of his head and trickled down his cheekbones, across his collarbone, to the tips of his fingers, his knees, and his toes. "You…" he seethed, "you can't do that. If Carl and Daryl killed, then it was in self-defense."

"Rick, I have no way of knowing—"

" _My son is just a kid_!"

"Yes, he is," said a deep but crisp voice. Rick turned to the door to see a slim, balding man in a tailored three-piece suit. He was pale and short – the same height as the boy beside him.

"Dad!" Carl cried. He sprinted into Rick's arms. Maggie appeared behind the short man. She yelled her husband's name and ran to Glenn. "Dad, I had to," Carl hiccupped. "They were beating Daryl to death. I did what you would do – what you did back by the tracks!"

Maggie pointed at the dead bodies. "They're from Woodbury. They were going to kill us all!"

Morgan approached the short man. "Sir?"

"I'm letting the boy go, Sheriff." The short man adjusted his black bowtie and raised his chin. "The other man – Dixon – he volunteered to endure both his punishment and the boy's."

"What are you going to do to him?" Rick asked.

"I haven't decided yet. Rick Grimes, I presume, yes?" The short man held out a small, clean hand. "I'm The Judge." Rick didn't shake his hand. "I'm the one who enforces the rules around Eden. I'm an eye-for-an-eye kind of man. If you take someone's wife, he gets yours. If you steal a man's food, he gets your portion. And if you kill someone, well…"

Rick's fingers ached from being clenched into fists for so long. "You kill Daryl," he whispered, " _over my dead body_!"

"Sir, if it truly was self-defense," Morgan began.

"What if we leave?" Glenn asked. "Daryl, all of us. We'll just leave. You won't have to punish anybody."

The Judge held up his palm at the onslaught of shouts. "I am willing to hear all sides of this story in due time. There will be no execution today. Meanwhile, Mr. Grimes, I thought you might want to see to Mr. Dixon's injuries. It would be a shame if he bled to death in his cell before his trial."

* * *

The guard unlocked the closet door and slammed it shut on Rick's heels. Rick took a small gas lantern out of his bag and switched it on. The makeshift jail in the Blue Tower basement was, ironically, the same size as the real cells back at the prison. The same size, but far less accommodating. Morgan's goons hung Daryl by his wrists from ropes tied to the ceiling. Ropes long enough that his bare feet touched the floor, but too short for him to lie down or sit. His black t-shirt and dark blue jeans were ripped. Every square inch of visible skin had turned some shade of black, blue, purple, green or mustard yellow. Rick doubted that Daryl could stand up for long if he wanted.

" _Shit_ ," Rick spat. He unsheathed his knife, stood up on his tiptoes and started sawing through the rope. When it was nearly severed he wrapped his arms around Daryl's torso and shouldered his weight. Daryl's arms fell to his sides like clipped wings. His limp body landed against Rick's, chin hooked over his shoulder, and Rick slowly slid down the wall to land on the floor with the upper half of Daryl's body cradled in his arms. The lantern light landed on Daryl's pale face. Daryl was awake – white lips parted slightly, eyelids only halfway open, eyes blinking infrequently, and slow. Eyes usually full of spark, full of fight, now looked lifeless.

"Sasha?" Daryl whispered between swollen lips. "Ty?"

Rick wanted to lie. Wanted it more than anything at that moment. Instead, because he couldn't trust his voice, he shook his head "no."

Daryl licked his lips and swallowed audibly. "Carl…"

"He's ok. He's with Michonne."

"Judy… Maggie…"

"Everyone's all right, Daryl."

"Are you?" Daryl frowned, confused. "Am I?"

Rick took a bandage out of the bag – one of Tara's shirtsleeves – and held it in midair. He looked up and down his friend's broken body but didn't know where to begin to help him. A violent sob crept up on Rick like a hiccup. " _Daryl_ —"

"Rick," Daryl croaked, "just hold me, will ya?" Muscles flexed, and tendons twitched in Daryl's neck as he tried to restrain his emotions. "Just hold me." Daryl's face slumped against the inside of Rick's elbow and his eyes drifted shut. Rick wrapped him snug in his arms, pressed his nose against Daryl's trembling shoulder and stopped fighting the tears.

* * *

Carol was asleep for barely two hours when Penelope shook her shoulder. "I'm sorry," the younger woman whispered. "I'm sorry, but I can't pick him up by myself."

"It's ok," Carol said out of habit more than geniality. She scooped up the dishtowels she was using for a pillow and set them back on the penthouse kitchen counter. "Maggie isn't back yet?"

"No. And there was some sort of problem in the Green Tower. Three people are dead." Penelope's long, dark hair whipped over her shoulder as she darted between the suddenly white-faced Carol and the door. "It wasn't any of your friends. I asked around. I checked for you."

Carol sighed with relief and smiled into the woman's dark eyes. "Thank you. Really."

Penelope nodded. "Us helpers have to stick together," she said. "That's what you told me the first day I met you." Penelope led the way across the vast penthouse living room towards one of the five enormous bedrooms. Three doors – The Serpent's, The Sheriff's, and The Judge's – were already open and the rooms were empty. The Surgeon's bear-like snores echoed from his bedroom next to Morgan's.

"Penelope!" a voice bellowed. "Get in here, bitch, I'm hungry!"

Carol rolled her eyes at her friend. "If he was my son I'd slap him!" she whispered. Penelope cupped her lips to cover a giggle. She opened the door and the two women entered the room. The young man in the bed, The Serpent's son and fellow councilmember, was no older than eighteen or nineteen. Blond hair, striking blue irises, freckles under his eyes like star constellations, he was probably very attractive in the old days. Not the "before the end of the world" old days, the days before the teen was confined to a wheelchair after his broken legs failed to heal properly. Carol didn't know the details of his accident. They didn't matter. He was such an epic asshole that she'd never feel sorry for him.

"Good morning, Eric," Penelope said brightly. She pulled back the floor-to-ceiling drapes covering the windows and the new day's sunlight burst into the room.

"Ugh, warn me before you do that, _skank_!" Eric covered his face like Penelope had just tried to stab his eyes. He picked up a pile of papers from his bedside table and Frisbee-ed them at her face. Carol clamped her teeth together. She distracted herself by retrieving the rusty green wheelchair out of the closet. Eric wheezed and whined as he peeled back his six blankets and scooted to the side of the bed. "Pick those up!" he shouted at Carol, pointing at the paper littering the floor.

"Yes, sir," Carol growled. She and Penelope both selected one of Eric's arms and legs and put him in the wheelchair. He was still whining about how rough they handled him when Penelope rolled him into the dining room.

Carol sighed and started to gather the papers up. The name caught her eye because it was so rare. Merle Dixon was the only Merle she'd ever had the displeasure to meet. Because the world was too small now to contain coincidences, Carol knew that the "Merle D." scribbled in crayon on a yellowed piece of notebook paper was the man she knew, and so was the name beside it: "Daryl D." Carol flipped the paper over and saw some of the notes Eric took as the council's unofficial secretary. Flipping it again, she examined the other names, numbers and words. It was a betting sheet. Someone named Lucas wagered six bullets that Merle would beat Daryl. Another named Martinez bet seven that Daryl would win. Only one more person bet on Daryl – the rest put all their "money" on Merle. That one person was John Cain who – Carol knew – was Eric's father. The female helpers called him The Serpent for several reasons, but initially because he liked giving fresh apples to "his" women.

Pieces of information fell together in Carol's mind like a puzzle. The only logical reason why Eric would have a betting sheet from a fight between Merle and Daryl Dixon was because he and his father were from…

" _Woodbury_ ," Carol whispered in horror.

"Woodbury was a utopia," said a silk-smooth voice from the door. Carol stood and slowly turned around. The Serpent, a tall, graying man with a greasy mustache, plaid shirt and red cowboy boots, was leaning against the doorframe with his hairy arms crossed against his chest. "Utopia until that night you assholes attacked us." A tobacco-stained finger pointed at Carol. "You shot our friends and tossed a smoke grenade into the arena. We couldn't see. Everybody was scared and just… just started to run. I grabbed my wife and daughter but my son, well, Eric got lost in the crowd. When the smoke cleared I found him with both legs broken in several places."

The Serpent approached Carol. She took one shaky step backwards and then planted her feet and stood her ground. The betting sheet fell from her fingers and landed as soft as a feather on the bed.

"We left that night. Me, Eric, my wife and daughter, and three buddies of mine. We were forced back into the woods. Molly, and our little girl, Samantha, they were both killed by Biters. They were killed because we had to leave our home. _Because you and your friends destroyed it_!" The Serpent grabbed Carol's shoulders and slammed her onto the bed. "I was in The Governor's inner circle. I knew Merle. I was there when he brought in those two from your group – Maggie and… Glenn, is it?" Carol didn't move. "Imagine it. Imagine my shock when Maggie showed up _here_. Shows up asking for sanctuary, for a home. Asking for _my help_!" The Serpent rammed his fists into the pillows.

Carol scrambled off the bed. There was nowhere to go but against the window. She was trapped.

"I was biding my time," The Serpent hissed. "Let you all get settled. Let you think you were safe here. A dish best served cold, right? When Rick took the others on his wild goose chase I knew it was time. You were never supposed to know about me, Carol, at least not until all your friends were gone and my hands were around your neck." The Serpent raised those hands. Carol willed herself to disappear into the glass.

"Last night, Daryl Dixon murdered my three best friends. When his execution is scheduled, _I'll behead him myself_!"

* * *

Rick and Morgan climbed the Red Tower stairs side-by-side. "I'm sorry," Morgan said for the eighth time. "You gotta understand, Rick. When the council appointed me sheriff of this place, I promised to be fair. That means not playing favorites. When I got to the scene, Carl's gun was still warm from firing those bullets. If I just let him go, what kind of message would that send to the rest of the community?"

Rick chewed on his bottom lip. It was an anxious habit, he realized, that he'd acquired from Daryl. "So, if The Judge hadn't intervened, you would've strung up my son by his wrists just like your goons did to Daryl?"

Morgan stopped on the twelfth story landing and grabbed Rick's elbow. "They did that? Jesus, Rick, I had no idea. I didn't tell them to."

Rick shook his hand aside. "A sheriff is supposed to know what his deputies do," he spat. "Their actions are your responsibility, Morgan."

"I know. I'm sorry. I'm sorry about that, too."

Rick whirled on him. "Didn't I once hear you tell my son to never say sorry?"

Morgan's mouth opened, closed, and then opened again. "Rick, I – I barely remember that day. I wasn't thinking straight. After I lost Duane I went crazy for a while – I know I did. When I came out of it, it was like waking up from a long nightmare."

"Do you remember stabbing me in that nightmare?" Rick demanded. "Do you remember that I had the chance and the _right_ to kill you, and I didn't?"

"I…" Morgan stuttered.

"Remember this," Rick fumed. "You're the one who owes _me_ now, and this is how you're going to return the favor: help me save Daryl. _Please_." Morgan followed Rick the rest of the way with his head bowed like a chastised dog.

The Red Tower penthouse was the most luxurious thing Rick had seen since the end of the world. Not only was it the highest ground and therefore the safest location from the Walkers, but there were more pillows than people, bowls of hard candy, salted almonds, and dried peaches, jugs of clear water, and music playing! Solar panels on the roof sent electricity straight into the penthouse. There was enough to power a small CD player, a coffeemaker, and the microwave was purring. Four helpers, none of whom were Maggie or Carol, rushed around the kitchen making five plates of food. Potatoes boiled on the stovetop. Chicken feathers littered the floor. One woman, who had to be Penelope based on Maggie's description, was cleaning pecans and fresh tomatoes.

The four other council members were on a couch in front of a bay window. Morgan sat on the far end next to the man Rick recognized as The Surgeon. The Judge was there as well, still wearing his three-piece suit. He was seeing the other two for the first time – a mustached man in red cowboy boots and a teenage boy in a wheelchair. The Serpent and his son, Eric. Rick shriveled a bit inside when The Serpent glared daggers, arrows, and lightning right at his heart. They had never met, as far as Rick knew, but the man clearly despised him.

Rick cleared his throat and silently chastised himself for not spending the thirty-story climb planning exactly what he was going to say. He had to be at the top of his game. His best friend's life depended on it. "Gentlemen," he said, "thank you for seeing me. It's important that I speak to you before Daryl Dixon's trial tomorrow."

Eric snorted. "Trial? I think you mean sentencing."

Rick licked his lips and chewed briefly on the bottom one. "One of the hallmarks of a civilized society is a justice system. Before all this I was a sheriff's deputy. I know how important justice is."

"There's only topic on the table, _officer_ ," The Serpent said with a sarcastic tongue. "Did Dixon kill those men?"

"Yes, but—"

"And you're well aware that the law around here is an eye for an eye?"

"Yes, but—"

"Then tomorrow's 'trial' is just a formality." The Serpent put air quotes around the word "trial." "Your friend's gonna hang, officer. There ain't nothing you can do about it."

Rick felt his face turn red. He turned to his right, putting his back to John and Eric. "He's not wrong," The Judge said before Rick could speak. "Mr. Dixon is guilty."

"He saved my kids' lives," Rick said. He couldn't hide the desperation in his pleading voice. "Who knows what those men were capable of? He could've done this whole camp a favor when he shot them! They were monsters!"

"They weren't!" Eric cried. "I mean – I mean, we don't know anything about them. It ain't fair to assume they were bad men."

"They nearly beat Daryl to death!" Rick roared. "If that ain't bad, what is?"

"Murder is," said The Surgeon. The plump, sour-faced man looked bored with the proceedings. "As much as it pains me to see my recent surgical skills go to waste, I'm going to vote for his execution. Even if these two vote in his favor," the doctor said, pointing his thumb at Morgan and The Judge, "that's still three-to-two that your friend dies." He patted his overgrown stomach. "You're excused, Mr. Grimes. It's time for our dinner."

Rick's fingers twitched. Suddenly he took his pistol out of its sheath. He didn't raise it, didn't point it. He turned it over and handed it, handle first, to The Judge. "You're about trading, right? And it's an eye for an eye, right?" he asked. "Fine. Then I trade myself for Daryl. Execute me instead."

* * *

Daryl woke up to find a slim figure stood silhouetted in the closet doorway. A halo of light surrounded the face, disguising it, but Daryl recognized the outline. "You hear to bust me out?" Daryl asked. He pushed himself up, and then immediately collapsed back against the cement wall. "Rick?" Rick entered the closet slowly, like they were back at the plantation tiptoeing around landmines. A shock of blood stunned Daryl. The back of Rick's head was soaked. "Hey, man, you hurt?" Rick still didn't speak. He knelt as close to Daryl as he could without touching him. His eyes were vacant and distant. Lifeless. Fear trickled down Daryl's skin and goose bumps bloomed in its wake.

" _Rick_?"

 **TWENTY MINUTES AGO**

The Serpent was on the verge of springing out of his seat. "Let me do it," he begged The Judge. "Let me shoot him!"

"You get Daryl, but I called dibs on Rick!" Eric whined. "Michonne, too – and that white bitch she was with, what's her name – Andrea!"

Rick's mouth went dry, and for a moment he didn't know why. "There's no Andrea with us," he said. "How – how do you even know that name?"

Another glare between The Serpent and Eric. "Morgan told me about everyone in your group," Eric explained, nearly tripping over his words he said them so fast.

Rick wracked his brain. He'd told Morgan a lot between their walks around the Towers, their conversations in his home town, and the one-sided reports over the radio that were apparently never intercepted. But when did he mention Andrea? Rick's train of thought was derailed when The Judge spoke up. "Gentlemen," he said softly, "it disturbs me how eager you are to kill a man. Besides, it's The Sheriff's job to perform executions, not yours." The man leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. "You do know what you're doing, right, Mr. Grimes? I want everybody in this room to hear it loudly and clearly. You, Rick, are volunteering to die in Daryl's place?"

In response, Rick got down on his knees and folded his hands in his lap. "I, Richard Andrew Grimes, am willingly surrendering my life on the condition that Daryl Dixon is pardoned." Rick spread his hands out. "I'm ready if you are."

The Judge settled back into the couch cushion and placed a thumbnail between his teeth. "If you think this noble act of self-sacrifice will somehow change our minds, you're mistaken." Rick merely blinked. "You have a son. A daughter, too, if I remember correctly."

"Yes," said Rick. "They're my family. I'd die for them. Daryl is my family, too. Not just my best friend, not just my brother, but both and beyond. I'll gladly die so that he can live."

"You're not joking?"

"Why would I joke about this?" Rick whispered. Water hovered in his eyes. "I have nothing to gain, you have nothing to lose. Do it."

Emotion flickered behind The Judge's stoic expression. "I admire you, Mr. Grimes. _Officer_ Grimes," he said respectfully. "A man such as yourself should be on this council, governing the people instead of dying for them. Too many good people have died already…" Without looking, The Judge handed Rick's gun to Morgan and said, "Get on with it then. It is, after all, the man's dying wish."

Morgan was sweating through his button-down shirt. Rick expected him to argue. The man couldn't put down his wife after she was dead, so how could he shoot a friend who was still alive? But Morgan got up. He avoided eye contact as he walked around Rick and stuck the barrel of the gun against the back of his skull. "Rick?" he whispered tentatively.

"It's ok," Rick assured him. He took one last look at the stars in the night sky outside the window, and then closed his eyes. "Do it." _I'm coming, Lori_ , he thought.

"Guess I do owe you a favor," Morgan whispered. He cocked the gun. "I'm sorry."

The gunshot was deafening. Rick was confused – why was he deaf, not dead? He opened his eyes and saw The Judge, The Surgeon and The Serpent all leap to their feet in shock. Something splashed down on Rick's hair. He pawed at it, found it wet and warm and, to his horror, red. Although he didn't want to turn around – his brain screamed at his body to stop moving – he couldn't help but look. Transparent smoke exhaled from his gun which lay still and lifeless like the hand that held it.

Something metallic clattered against the floor in front of him. Keys. The Judge had tossed them to him. "You wanted justice," the old man said with a thick voice. "We got our blood, and Daryl is free to go. You go. Go, now. _Out of my sight_." The Judge rubbed his eyes and retreated to his bedroom.

Dazed, Rick pocketed the keys, sheathed his weapon and stood up on buckling knees. Before he got to the door, The Judge peeked back into the living room. "Officer Grimes?" Rick didn't turn around – couldn't – because that would force him to look at the body again. "A seat has recently become available on our council. I'm appointing you the new sheriff."

Rick didn't say yes, and didn't say no. He opened the penthouse door when The Judge's door shut, and stumbled his way down the stairs. At the halfway point he sat and wept for half a minute. When he was empty and numb, he picked up his pace, sprinting to the Blue Tower.

 **PRESENT**

" _Rick_?" Daryl took his friend by the shoulders and shook him. "You're creeping me out, man, say something!"

Rick exhaled a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding. "It – it's ok," he whispered. He wanted to say more, to explain, but he knew that once he let those words out he wouldn't be able to herd them back again. Rick contained the words, but not the emotions trailing them. Silently, he wrapped his arms tight around his stomach and slumped forward. His forehead landed on Daryl's thigh and stayed there. Trembling, reluctant fingers patted his back, his head, and then rested firmly on the back of his neck. Rick watched, for minutes on end, as his tears gradually turned Daryl's blue jeans black.

* * *

"It's ok," came Rick's voice, drifting through a vent leading into the living room. "Do it."

Carol squirmed against the thick ropes latching her wrists to her ankles. She'd been fighting all day against her bonds and screaming into the ball of yarn stuffed inside her mouth. Her friend's name just came out as a "RRR" that echoed in the dark space of The Serpent's bedroom closet. The Serpent knew a whole hell of a lot about tying people up. He'd bent her legs and angled her arms back in a way that any movement she made was excruciating. She couldn't even kick the walls or slam her head against the door. What a nightmare it was being so close to Rick – within earshot – and still not being able to reach him. When she first recognized his tenor voice she prayed that he'd find her. Now her one and only prayer was that she wasn't about to hear him die.

The gunshot sounded like a giant snapping his fingers. It was crisp and quick, and the dull sound of flesh flopping against the floor followed it immediately.

Carol roared. Ignoring the strained tendons and dislocated joints, she rolled herself head over heels and slammed her body against the closet door. Swears, curses, and more swears churned up thick saliva in her mouth that soaked right through the yarn. Footsteps. Hope flickered in Carol's heart. Rick was alive. He heard her. He was coming for her!

Someone kicked open the bedroom door and kicked it shut again. The lantern light was dim but still blinding to Carol's eyes. A calloused hand dragged her out of the closet by her extra short gray hair and slammed her against an oak dresser. Dazed, it took Carol a couple minutes to get her bearings, and another sixty seconds to recognize The Serpent hovering over her. "Rick Grimes," he seethed at her, his cheeks as red as his boots, "is – is - is…" Spittle rained down on Carol's bruised nose. " _My nemesis_!" the man finally bellowed. "And Dixon! That son of a bitch, _why won't he die_?"

A boot collided with Carol's exposed stomach. Suddenly, she was back in the bedroom she once shared with Ed. He always went for her stomach, too.

The Serpent picked up a half-used roll of duct tape off his bed and threw it through a full-length mirror. Glass shattered, nicking Carol's ears. "Should've shot him in Woodbury. Should've gone with The Governor to attack the prison. _Should've shot Grimes myself when he walked through the penthouse door_!"

Carol got her breath back and watched the deranged man. She thought that people only pulled out their own hair in angry fits on television shows and cartoons, but The Serpent was yanking by the fistful. "My wife, my daughter, I see them every night. Every night they're in my dreams asking why Grimes and Dixon get to live instead of them. They talk to me!" he told Carol. His body softened, and he knelt beside her, caressed her white cheek with a hairy knuckle, and whispered, "They tell me that they can't sleep in peace until your friends are dead."

Carol reared back away from The Serpent's touch. Somehow the shift from rage to peacefulness was the most disturbing thing he'd done. "I can't wait," he whispered. "I was a fool to let my friends go after them, a fool to think they wouldn't find some loophole in The Judge's punishment…"

Carol's heart skipped not one beat, but several. _They_. He said _they_. Was Rick still alive?

"What would you do?" The Serpent whispered. His eyes were too wide, his words pronounced too cleanly. "If those men were responsible for hurting someone you love – even if they weren't directly involved - you'd kill them, right?"

Carol thought of her sweet, dead Sophia, and shook her head fiercely.

He punched her so hard between the eyes that she blacked out. When she came to, she saw that The Serpent had overturned a cedar chest onto his rumpled bed sheets. It was dark outside – still night, then, but there was no way to tell how late or how early. The Serpent muttered indistinguishable words to himself as he loaded rounds into a shotgun. His son, the wheelchair-bound Eric, must have come in at some point because he sat on the edge of the bed cracking his knuckles anxiously. "Pa, I want 'em dead, too," he said. "But where are we gonna live after this? They deserve it, yes sir they do, but we'll have to run or get executed ourselves!"

The Serpent seemed not to hear him. "Soon, Molly baby," he said. "Soon, soon, soon."

"Pa!"

The Serpent jumped, whirled around and pointed his weapon at his son. "Oh, Eric," he gasped when he saw who was there. "Oh good, my boy. You and me. You and me, son, we're going to finish this. We're going to help Mom and Molly rest. This morning the Judge'll have a funeral for Morgan in place of Dixon's trial. Everyone will be there." He cocked his shotgun with one hand by hefting it quickly up and down.

" _You sons of bitches_!" Carol tried to yell around her gag.

"No more hesitating," The Serpent whispered. "We'll gun them all down today."

Carl hissed as Michonne dragged a brush through his hair. "Is this a mom thing?"

"Is _what_ a mom thing?" she asked with a smile perched on her lips. She was on the Grimes' apartment couch and he sat Indian-style on the floor, leaning back against her knees.

Small nests of dead hair floated down into Carl's lap. "Torturing kids like this?"

Michonne snorted. "Toughest kid in the world and you whine about getting your hair brushed?" She fought her way through a tight knot. "Think I found something nesting in it. Little critters that have never seen the light of day. Might be easier just to cut it."

Carl scratched the back of his neck. "I wanna grow it long. Like Daryl's."

"You should try dreads. Less maintenance."

"Shaving it all off would be even less."

"Your little head would get cold. You'd look like Lex Luther."

"We gotta go looking for more comics soon. I've read the ones we have, like, five times."

"Talk to the other kids. I bet they have some to trade."

Carl put his dad's hat back on and climbed up onto the couch. "Have you met the kids around here? Bunch of babies. Probably just have 'Calvin and Hobbes' or something."

Daryl emerged from the master bedroom. He wore his leather vest for the first time since they got to Eden. The black tee he had on under it was loose and his jeans were barely held up by his belt. He'd lost a lot of weight in two weeks. "You should write your own comics," he said. Daryl stretched his arms above his head, yawned, and collapsed onto the couch between Michonne and Carl with his long arms around both of their shoulders. "Super Carl."

Carl scowled. "That isn't a superhero name."

Daryl fondly patted the top of the teen's head. "Yeah it is."

Across from the couch the bathroom door opened and Rick emerged buttoning up a clean collared shirt. "You don't gotta come if you don't feel up to it," he said to Daryl without looking at him.

"I had a nap." Daryl cocked an eyebrow. "And I want to. Wanna pay my respects. I owe that dude a lot."

"So do I," Rick sighed. "I owe lots of people."

"So do I."

The Grimes' door, still Swiss cheese from when the men from Woodbury attacked, swung open slowly. Tara walked in with Judith in her arms. She took a blue keychain out of her jeans pocket and held it out to the group. "Look what I found." The keychain was from some local car dealership – navy blue rubber with one word on it in white: FORD. "Thought Rosita might like it."

Carl nodded his approval. "What did you have to trade for it?"

"Just a yo-yo," Tara said with a shrug.

"You loved that yo-yo!"

Two more people at the door: Glenn and Maggie. "They're ready," Glenn reported. He shared a look with Maggie. "We asked around about Carol. Nobody's seen her."

Rick and Daryl shared the same look that they did. "Who saw her last?" Rick asked. "When was the last time any of us saw her? Maggie?"

Maggie shook her head. "Day and a half, I guess."

Daryl stood up. "We should go look for her."

"We will," Rick agreed. "After the funeral."

Antonio suddenly crawled into the room from between Glenn and Maggie's legs. "Ricky? The man wants to talk to you, Ricky. The Judge man." He scampered over to the couch and sat on the armrest behind Carl, as far away from the door as possible. He took his sweat-stained Braves cap off, folded the brim, and stuffed it in his back pocket.

Maggie, Glenn, and Tara stepped aside as the short, bald Judge entered the apartment. His tailored three-piece suit was wrinkled as if it had been slept in. "Hello again Carl, Mr. Dixon, Mister – I mean – _Sheriff_ Grimes," he greeted. "All of you. Officer, I wanted to chat with you before – before we get started. I wanted to see if you wouldn't mind saying a few words about Morgan since he… since he did that for you."

Rick nodded. "I was planning to."

"I had another thought. I thought that since the whole community will be there that it might be an appropriate time to announce your appointment to Sheriff. After the funeral, of course."

Rick licked his lips. He stared down at his boots, took a deep breath, and then looked up again. "I haven't decided to accept that position yet. In fact, I have a couple people in mind to recommend to you." He looked sidelong at Glenn and Daryl.

The Judge's face hardened but he didn't push the matter. "We'll speak of it after, then. I'll inform the rest of the council." He left without closing the door.

Rosita peeked in a second later. "It's starting," she said.

While the others filed out, Tara lagged with Judith and the keychain. "Got you something," she said to Rosita. "I know – after Abraham – I know he's been on your mind a lot and I saw this, and it had his last name and – _oof_!"

Rosita lunged forward and wrapped her arms tight around Tara's neck. "Oh," she breathed, "I can't tell you how much I appreciate…" She gave Tara a quick peck on the cheek and shut the door behind them as they left the apartment. "I know we've all been worried about Daryl and then there was Tyreese and Sasha but… but it's been two weeks and we haven't had a memorial service for Abraham and Eugene and Gabriel and I just…" Rosita took a deep, staggering breath between her teeth. "Thank you," she said again.

"Zero point zero zero sweat," Tara assured her. "Least I could do. These people we ended up with, the way they sacrifice themselves for each other… Daryl for Carl, Rick for Daryl, Morgan for Rick… Just got me thinking about Abraham, you know? How he died for Glenn."

"Me, too," said Rosita. She held the hallway door open and stepped aside as Tara carried Judith through. "Me, too…" After a minute of thought, Rosita grasped the keychain in her left hand and slid the silver key ring around her ring finger.

 **TWO WEEKS AGO**

Carol sat in the penthouse living room with nothing but the moon to keep her company. The silver light seemed to give the wings on Daryl's vest an angelic glow. Carol scratched away scabs of dry blood and scraped remnants of Walker juices with her fingernails. Taking care of Daryl's vest was the next best thing to taking care of him. He was in surgery. His wellbeing was out of her hands at that moment. So, she waited, and she cleaned, and she thought about all the scars on Daryl's naked body when she helped strip him down for the operation. The marks on his back made her a little queasy. The scars on his legs made her downright nauseated. All she could imagine that could make lines like that was barbed wire. Someone, somewhere, sometime, wrapped razor wire around his legs and _pulled_. Carol couldn't help but imagine Daryl's father, who in her head looked like Merle, mercilessly torturing her precious friend for years… He didn't deserve that. He'd suffered so much and right now he was suffering again…

The men she'd only met a few hours before, and only knew as The Surgeon and The Serpent, barged in just as she was drifting off to sleep with her arms hugging the vest to her heart. She sprang to her feet. "Is he ok?"

The Surgeon grabbed a roll of paper towels off the kitchen counter and wiped his bloody hands. He shrugged, in an infuriatingly casual manner, and said, "He'll live."

The Serpent opened one of the bedroom doors, disappeared for a moment, and then reemerged. "That new helper who signed on with you – Maggie – where is she?"

"She – she's with her husband, Glenn," Carol said. "Can I see Daryl? Is he awake? Does he need—"

"Have one of the helpers wake up Penelope for me," The Serpent spat. He rubbed his forehead like a hurricane of a headache just hit. "I'll take her."

"I'm supposed to have Penelope tonight," The Surgeon said to The Serpent. His chubby red face turned to Carol. "Guess you'll do. Get in there." He gestured to another bedroom.

"Excuse me?" Carol squared her shoulders and lifted her chin high. "What the hell do you mean by that?"

"What the hell do you think I mean?" The Surgeon asked in a soft but stern voice. He scratched his chin through his salt and pepper beard and gestured again at the bedroom. "You volunteered to be a helper, so you belong to me. You'll do what I tell you to. Now get in there."

Carol lunged for the exit, but The Serpent caught her around the midsection. "Maybe I _will_ have you tonight," he hissed in her ear. "You've got some spunk!"

"Let go of me," Carol ordered. "Get off me now – _right now_!"

The Serpent held her arms behind her back while The Surgeon took her chin in one hand. "Your friend Daniel, do you want him to die?" the doctor whispered.

" _Daryl_."

"Daryl. Do you want him to die? Because if you don't do what we want, _exactly_ what we want, he will."

"You won't get near him," Carol said. "Rick, our other friends, they'll protect him."

The Surgeon caressed her face and smiled when Carol tried to bite his finger. "Maybe I'll 'accidentally' drop all of our antibiotics in the river. Maybe instead of putting saline in his IV I'll put in lighter fluid!" His hand suddenly wrapped around her neck. "I saw the way you looked at him. You love him. You haven't decided yet if you love him like a friend or a brother, or if you want him as a lover, but you love that man. And I'll kill him. I'll kill him tonight – right now if you don't shut your face and go into the bedroom. Do you understand? Do you understand me, woman?"

Carol deflated. Parts of her flickered out, and others glowed brighter than ever before. Parts that nothing and nobody could harm. Not the Walkers. Not Ed. Not this pair of pricks. Whatever happened, whatever she had to do to protect Daryl, she would do it holding her head high.

 **PRESENT**

Eric rolled his wheelchair onto the balcony and set the sniper rifle against the iron railing. The Towers of Eden were emptying. Everyone was walking to the graveyard behind the Red Tower for Morgan's funeral. He saw his father follow Rick to the graveside and stand behind him. It could happen at any second. Any time now The Serpent could take his gun out of his pocket and shoot Rick in the back of the head. And if he failed – if by some miracle he was stopped – Eric was his backup. If The Serpent didn't shoot Rick with his handgun, Eric would take his head off with his rifle.

Scuffling behind him. Eric looked over his shoulder and chuckled at the sight of Carol trying to make her way to him across the bedroom floor. With her wrists tied behind her and attached to her ankles, she could barely shift her weight let alone get to the balcony in time to stop him. "You're the best entertainment I've had in a year," Eric sneered at her. "That's right. Cry all you want. Only shot you have at getting loose is if you dislocate both of your shoulders!"

He turned back to the scene below. The Judge was making the gestures he usually made when making some grand bullshit speech. The Serpent still stood behind Rick. His hand was in his pocket – no doubt clutching his weapon. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. Eric saw the body language cue. He lifted his rifle, set it on the railing in front of him, and found Rick through the scope.

* * *

Daryl reckoned that half the population of Eden congregated for Morgan's funeral. They sat on old buckets, warped milk crates, rusty lawn chairs, and picnic blankets. When the yard filled up, kids climbed up onto the pump house roof and men and women sat on the Red Tower balconies with their feet dangling. The Judge stood on a pile of wooden pallets and addressed the crowd through a battery-powered megaphone. It was a hot-as-hell kind of morning. The old man was sweating through his three-piece suit. He wrote his eulogy for Morgan on a yellow napkin, then used that napkin to mop up the sweat on his bald head. Daryl couldn't hold in a snort when The Judge's forehead turned black from smeared ink. Carl caught his eye and the pair shared a brief grin.

Daryl barely listened to the eulogy. His tracker's eyes were busy scanning the crowd for a familiar face. Twice he thought he spotted Carol's short gray hair but after a solid eight minutes of looking, she was nowhere to be found. The saltine crackers and peaches he had for breakfast squirmed in his stomach. Something was wrong with Carol. He just knew it. Daryl was musing on this and chewing on his bottom lip when the quiet ceremony suddenly morphed into a chaotic circus.

Daryl saw Michonne unsheathe her sword and slam it downwards with the force of a guillotine. The gun that The Serpent was pointing was sliced in two, but not before it spat a bullet. It should've pierced the back of Rick's skull but Michonne nudged it just in time to change the angle. She changed the angle, but not far enough. " _ **No**_!" Daryl shouted when the bullet barreled into Rick's back. He saw, as if in slow motion and from a greater distance, as Rick toppled forward like a tree trunk, bumped his head against the pallets and smashed, face-first, into the grass. Michonne tackled The Serpent and they rolled.

" _Dad_!" Carl cried. He ran two steps when Glenn's iron arms wrapped around him.

"Everybody look out!" Glenn screamed as he pinned Carl to the ground. A second bullet, this one from the opposite direction, barely missed Rick and instead hit The Surgeon in the forehead when he hurried over to help. The momentum knocked the body backwards into the river. It was swallowed up instantly.

Daryl knew that his feet were moving but it felt like he was in quicksand. It took forever and a half to get to Rick's side. More bullets rained down on the crowd. People screamed, scattered, stampeded in every direction. Daryl threw himself flat on top of Rick and shielded him with his body. Tara and Rosita ran past with Antonio and a screaming, squirming Judith. Maggie was crawling on her knees to a woman twenty yards away who took a bullet to her hip. The Judge, who'd stood frozen, dumbfounded, on his little pallet stage, almost got shot in the foot. He squealed and dove behind Glenn and Carl.

The gunshots stopped as abruptly as they'd started. Like a quick burst of spring rain. "Up there!" a voice shouted that Daryl didn't recognize. "Top of the tower!" Daryl raised his head. He spotted two figures wrestling over a sniper rifle on one of the penthouse balconies. He didn't recognize the man in the wheelchair but the other one, he knew.

" _Carol_!" Daryl yelled. She didn't hear him. Couldn't, probably. The gunman had a good fifty pounds of weight on her and was trying to shove her right over the wrought iron balcony railing. Daryl looked down at Rick's still body, and then over at Glenn. " _Get to Carol_!" he ordered. Glenn rolled off Carl and got to his feet. He froze, then. Everybody did. A massive gasp of horror rose up from the entire audience. Carol got her shoulder under the man's chest and used his own momentum to knock him against the railing. He balanced on it for a second, wild fingers waving like a cartoon character, and then Carol flipped the rifle under his knees and pushed.

Daryl buried his face between Rick's shoulder blades. Before he shut his eyes, he saw Glenn force Carl to look away. Strangled, blubbering shrieks filled the whole forest and then Daryl heard the thud-crack of a human body hitting the ground at speeds it couldn't endure. The scene reverted to a funeral silence, and Daryl lifted his head. Glenn was sprinting towards the Red Tower to get Carol. Michonne and The Judge had The Serpent subdued on the ground. Carl stood above Daryl – face white, lips parted, eyes red.

Daryl expected to find his whole front side covered in the blood undoubtedly gushing out of Rick Grimes' back. When he did a push up and discovered that not only were his clothes clean but so were Rick's, that didn't make him feel better at first. He knew that the bullet could act like a cork holding in massive blood loss. He knew that if the heart stopped pumping then the blood would seep instead of spurt. Daryl's arms trembled so hard that they made Rick's entire body vibrate when he lifted his friend up and cradled him against his chest. He pressed his palm against the bullet hole and then examined it, expecting to see red.

"The hell…?" Daryl gulped. There was no blood. He unbuttoned Rick's shirt and pulled his arms out of the sleeves as fast as he could. The bulletproof vest Rick wore covered his entire torso. Daryl undid the Velcro straps and yanked the back of the vest towards them. Carl picked at the flattened bullet with dirty fingernails. It flopped out of the vest and rolled to the ground. "Holy shit, he's alive." Daryl confirmed it by checking for Rick's pulse, and then his breathing.

"That vest it – it was Morgan's," Carl stuttered, shocked. "He was wearing it when I shot him." Rick stirred slightly. His eyes fluttered but didn't stay open. Tears and snot poured down Carl's face. He fell halfway on top of his dad and hugged him tight.

Daryl put a stern hand on Carl's shoulder. "Careful," he said, his voice lower and huskier than normal. "Your old man's probably got one hell of a bruise."

The boy wiped his nose on his bare arm. "He's ok?"

"Just knocked out, I think," Daryl said. "He's got a bump on his head swelling fast. I'll get him home. Listen to me, Carl." Daryl tightened his grip on the kid and forced their eyes to meet. "I need you to take Antonio and Lil' Asskicker to Michonne's apartment. You stay there, you hear? One of us will come get you when we're sure it's safe."

"You'll take care of my dad?"

"Won't let him out of my sight." Daryl was surprised when Carl didn't put up a fight. Instead of arguing, he kissed his father on the cheek and then sprinted over to the rest of the group. Most of the population was back in their towers, peering through windows at Eric's flat body on the ground. Daryl lifted Rick into his arms and carried him to the Green Tower.

* * *

Rick's sternum ached. Lying on his back had to be more comfortable, so he did a pushup and rolled. His stomach tried to stay put, and his head tried to keep going, so the resulting whiplash in his torso made him nauseated. He opened his eyes. Light pierced them, pierced his skull. Briefly he spotted and recognized the bedside table in his room. He landed on his back, yelped, and arched up off the bed. Hands grabbed his arm and pulled until he was back on his stomach.

"Turn that damn flashlight off!" a gruff voice boomed. "He's probably got a migraine."

"If he does then the sound of you yelling will hurt him, too!" said a female voice.

The male retreated to a whisper. "Just leave the water and get out of here, will ya? Don't need a babysitter."

Silence, then, "You're angry with me."

"No, it's Rick I'm pissed at but there's no sense in yelling at him right now."

"Daryl, it's not his fault." Rick finally placed the voice to Carol's face.

"You shoulda told us."

Rick stiffened. He recognized Daryl's tone of voice. Braver men than him had cowered from it.

"That would've gotten you killed." Carol raised her voice. "Dammit, when are you going to get it through your head _that we love you_?"

"Ain't nobody worth you having to go through that!" Daryl bellowed. "Nobody!"

The noise made Rick's molars vibrate. He groaned and put his right hand over his ear and pawed blindly towards Daryl's voice with his left. The mattress sunk a few inches when Daryl sat on it and took Rick's hand in both of his. "Sorry," he whispered, and Rick wasn't sure if the apology was for him or for Carol. Footsteps, a door opening and shutting, and then a deep sigh. The room felt empty without Carol. Half a minute passed and then Daryl whispered, "You with me?"

Rick gargled wordless sounds. Opening his eyes was a risk but he did it anyway, and found Daryl leaning back against the headboard with his boots on the bed. Heat radiated from the archer's sweaty palms. The man still had a fever. Throbbing pain radiated from a spot two inches above Rick's right eye. "Head…" he said.

"Yeah," Daryl said. Rick tried to retrieve his hand so that he could poke at the wound, but Daryl snatched his fingers back. "You've got a good-sized bump. And you were shot in the back."

Rick immediately wiggled his toes, twitched his kneecaps, and bent his elbows. He could still feel and move everything. "Still alive, though."

"I thought you were dead."

Rick looked at his friend through half-lidded eyes. Muscles in his neck twitched with emotion. "Payback," Rick said.

Daryl cocked an eyebrow. "What?"

"I saw you get shot in the head back at the farm, remember? I thought you were dead. Now you know how that feels." Rick tried to smile but saw no spark in Daryl's eyes at his teasing. "What happened?"

Daryl sighed. The bags under his eyes looked bigger and darker than usual. As he told the story he slouched to the side. When he finished he just collapsed onto his left side, face to face with Rick. Rick had one question for him: "How did Carol get free?"

Daryl smiled proudly. "Dislocated her shoulders. Both of 'em. Loosened the ropes around her arms enough for her to wiggle them off."

"Jesus."

"Yeah, that's Michonne-level badass-ery right there," Daryl said. A yawn bloomed from his throat. He sighed and let his eyes fall shut.

Rick watched his friend for several minutes. He didn't realize that he was tearing up until he heard the emotion in his voice. "Carol and Maggie…" Daryl's eyes flashed open. "They lied… they really are slaves?"

"Were," Daryl corrected. "Glenn and I took care of a lot of shit while you were napping today. Cain – The Serpent – he's locked up tight in that closet they had me in. His boy Eric and the doc are dead, so it'd be kinda hard to punish them, though."

"The Judge? Morgan? Did they make the women do – do stuff, too?"

Daryl said "no" but his jaw turned to stone. "Judge claims he didn't even know it was going on but he knew. He must have. It was happening right under his nose. He saw the other council members take the girls into their rooms." Daryl shivered, disgusted. "If you ask me, he should be punished the same as Cain. Claiming ignorance… what bullshit!"

Rick swallowed. "You know I didn't know, right? I didn't. I swear I didn't."

"You suspected," Daryl whispered harshly. "Just like you suspected someone would shoot you. You didn't tell me about that, either. How am I supposed to watch your ass if you don't tell me when there's a threat?"

Rick frowned. "Daryl, you aren't my body guard." When Daryl didn't respond to that, Rick said, "If I really expected The Serpent to kill me, I wouldn't have stood in front of him. The vest was an afterthought. Eric mentioned Andrea in passing. Made me a little suspicious. I was going to confront him about it after Morgan's service. Or have the new sheriff do it."

"You should do it," Daryl said. "You should be sheriff. There ain't a council no more. Somebody's gotta lead these people. There's five hundred folks looking for a new leader, and it should be you."

Rick smiled with only half of his mouth. "Says the man who disagrees with every decision I've made in the past two weeks."

"I'd rather have you making dumbass decisions than somebody else making the right ones."

Rick winced as his headache increased. "That makes no sense."

"Says the man with a head wound." A small smile slipped out for a second before Daryl contained it again. "People here… They want to see The Serpent and The Judge go through a formal trial."

"What do you think?"

"I say lynch 'em both," Daryl spat. "But… you're the boss."

Rick sighed. "There's been enough death. I say we exile Cain. Not The Judge – not unless we have concrete proof – but he shouldn't have a leadership position anymore, that's for sure. Executions don't solve anything. That's what The Governor would do. I don't want to be him."

Daryl frowned. "You ain't. You're nothing like him."

"I'm gonna need your help," Rick whispered. "You, Glenn, everybody. Make sure I don't become that."

Daryl pursed his lips. "Let's make a deal. I'll help you keep your ego in check if you swear that you'll wear that bulletproof vest all the time." He settled deeper into his pillow until Rick could only see half of his face. "What I felt when I saw you get shot… Yeah, payback's a bitch."

 **To Be Continued**


	2. Chapter 2

**The Sisyphus Exodus**  
PenPatronus  
Part 2 of 2

 **ONE MONTH LATER**

John Cain was all beard and blood when he stumbled onto the camp. Four weeks alone in the woods – just walking, just drinking, just eating bugs and grass – he knew he was a sight to see, and wasn't surprised when a blond teen with a scar on his chin pointed a revolver. A second boy, a year or two younger and sporting black hair and green eyes, emerged from beneath an overturned canoe with a shotgun. The woman had to be the blond's mother. Same shape of the jaw and curve of the nose. She was hoisting a fishing net out of the river when they made eye contact.

"And who are you?" she asked sweetly with a hint of sass. "Looking like a sasquatch. Looking like a walking mouth you're so hungry."

Cain hadn't used his voice in weeks, so he grunted before he formed words. "I'll trade you a dozen matches for one fish," he said.

The woman set the net beside their fire. She wiped her hands on her apron and then folded her arms tight against her chest. "Twenty," she said.

The Serpent's nostrils flared. "Sixteen."

"Seventeen. We'll need one to light the fire to cook 'em."

"Deal." Ignoring the weapons still trained on him, Cain sat down and helped the woman start the fire, skin the fish, and skewer them with crooked sticks. At some unnoticed signal, the two boys sat down on either side of her and prepared their fish as well. "Where you from, sasquatch?"

Cain stared at his blackening fish. "A few miles south. With a big group – in apartments. Assholes exiled me."

Cain expected her to ask why he was thrown out, and he was surprised when she said, "Those towers, those three towers, were you there?"

Cain held his stick with both knees. He spat on the palms of his hands and rubbed his beard down and away from his hungry mouth. "That's the place."

The two teens exchanged astonished looks. Color flooded the woman's face. "I've seen it. From afar. Looks like a cozy place."

"That it was, that it was. Until my three best friends were murdered. Until they murdered my son. My boy, my good boy."

"I lost two sons," said the woman. "My husband. A niece. Still got Dustin here." She pointed at the blond, and then at the other one. "Kevin is my nephew. And cousins. Got a few cousins. A few."

"Where are they?"

"Out." The woman pointed southwest. "Saw some dogs last night chowing down on some Chompers. Sent them to gather 'em up."

"Good meat."

"We got other plans for them. We got lots of plans. Been planning for three weeks."

Cain snorted. "Three weeks. Three weeks ago was when these assholes showed up at my front door. Ruined my life. Ruined it all. Exiled me for something I – I failed at."

The woman tucked her legs underneath herself and rotated a few degrees. "You got new people three weeks ago? Tell me… Was there a man with a crossbow with them? A boy with a sheriff's hat? A woman with a sword?"

Cain was in the middle of a long drag of warm water. He froze, eyes wide. "Sure was. With about seventy other people. City folk, some country folk. Paranoid, arrogant, self-righteous pricks all of 'em." His eyes squinted. "What you know about them?"

"Do you want them dead?" The woman asked that question with the same tone of voice she would use when inquiring about the weather. "You say your friends are dead. You say your boy is dead. Do you want them dead?"

Cain considered the question. "I want revenge," he said.

The woman wore black gloves. The tips were cut off, but the visible fingers were nearly as dark. She held out her hand to him and smiled with yellow teeth. "Sir, my name is Eloise Pierce. My family – all us Pierce's around here – we'd like very much to help you get your revenge."

"Why?" Cain asked.

"Because…" One of The Matriarch's fish finished cooking and she tore it from the sparking stick. "It's our revenge, too."

 **TWO MONTHS LATER**

The hunting party was supposed to return the day before, so when the spotters on the Red Tower roof saw them through the trees late that morning, everyone came running. Glenn dismissed the teenagers in his science class. Carol ordered her students to read _The Adventures of Tom Sawyer_ to themselves until she returned. Michonne was on watch by the pump house, Rosita was pulling weeds in the garden, Tara was playing with Judith in daycare, Maggie was collecting chicken eggs, and Rick was in the Red Tower basement preparing for that evening's council meeting. Rick, wearing a clean navy t-shirt, dark blue jeans and black boots, raced down the slight hill to the bridge, crossed it in about two steps, and nearly tackled Carl with his hug. "God," he gasped into his son's hair, "I thought something happened to you guys."

"I'm fine, Dad," Carl managed to say even though his windpipe was nearly squeezed shut. His hat fell off and landed in the mud, but neither of them cared.

There were 20 people – the biggest party they had dared to send out – and the way family and friends went running into each other's arms reminded Rick of baggage claim scenes at an airport. Several of those returning reached out to shake Rick's hand as they passed, greeting him as "Sheriff," and showing off their squirrels, rabbits, fish, various edible plants, and a few random discoveries like cigarettes, a dry box of matches, a bag full of batteries, and a set of Uno cards. He recognized all their faces and knew half of their names. There was Hugh, a former accountant who was built like a linebacker. Edna, a sixty-year-old with long gray hair and two teeth. Rebeccah, a girl barely older than Carl who could teach them all a thing or two about tracking. Arty, a tall, twenty-something who had started to style his hair like Daryl's and hit on Rosita every chance he got. Penelope was with them, too. The meek Asian girl with almond-colored eyes was a pro at finding and identifying berries. She gave Rick a happy peck on the cheek.

Rick frowned as he counted heads. "Where are Daryl? Antonio?"

"Right here." Daryl was at the rear of the group. He and Antonio were dragging a heavy blue tarp behind them. "This kid shot us a buck!" Daryl announced proudly. Antonio blushed visibly when Daryl patted him on the back.

"What the hell took you guys so long?" Rick demanded more harshly than he meant to. "Did you run into a herd?"

Carl snorted. "Sort of."

"A pack of dogs!" Antonio said. He dropped his half of the tarp and held his arms out wide. "This big – no kidding – they were this big!"

"They were not!" Daryl said. "Poodles. Poodles, all of them."

"Except for the one that got you?" Carl prodded.

"Except for the one that got me. He was this big." Daryl held his arms out like Antonio's.

For the first time, Rick noticed that Daryl was limping, and that Antonio had a bandage around his right wrist. "They bit you?"

"The mutts were starving," Daryl said. He pulled the tarp the rest of the way to the bridge. "Probably wanted the rabbits more than us." Daryl let his crossbow slip to the ground. He raised his sweaty arms above his head and stretched.

"I didn't cry, Ricky." Antonio held his injured wrist up like it was a trophy. "Arty cried."

"Arty didn't cry," Carl rebuked.

"How many were bit?" Rick asked.

Daryl pointed at himself, Antonio, and then counted to six on his fingers as he pictured their faces. "Me, the kid, Arty, Louie, Therese, and Penelope. Therese bled a lot, so we waited 'til morning to keep hiking. Got everyone patched up – no infections."

"Everybody behave? Good teamwork? Did they follow your orders?

Daryl rolled his eyes. "I took 'em hunting, Rick. I didn't grade them."

Rick looked sidelong at Carl who said, "Everybody did good, Dad."

"Well. Everybody did _w_ _ell_ , son. We need to get you back in Carol's English class as soon as possible." Carl and Antonio jogged across the bridge to greet Glenn, Maggie, and the others. Rick took hold of the tarp with the dead deer in it and waved Daryl aside when the archer tried to help. "You ok?" he asked when they started walking and Daryl, now that he didn't have an audience, favored his left leg even more.

"I'd rather get bit by a dog than a Walker," Daryl grumbled. "Did we miss anything here?"

Rick shrugged. "Same old, same old. Normal routines. I almost hate to jinx it by saying this out loud, but things have been quiet." He knocked his knuckles against the wooden bridge rail as they crossed over it. "Brought in a few new people. Strays. A woman named Eleanora and a man whose name is Jake, I think. Nice folks. Grateful. Tough. Eleanora is… is…" Rick's voice trailed off.

Daryl's ears perked up. "What? Sick? Dangerous?"

Rick lowered his voice. "She's, uh, hot."

Daryl cocked a reluctant eyebrow. "Hot?" He chuckled once. "Ain't ever heard you say something like that."

"Haven't really had time to notice women," Rick said sheepishly. "But we're so settled here now. Took the time to actually enjoy eating my breakfast."

"You want to _enjoy_ this chick?"

Rick gave Daryl a measured look. "I think she's more your type."

Daryl snorted. "What exactly do you think my type is?"

"You'll see," Rick said mysteriously. "Wait, there's something else. Hey, Glenn? Rosita? Carry this, will ya?" Rick handed off the tarp to them and led Daryl back to the bridge. A long, thick rope hung over the railing and disappeared into the water. When Rick reeled it in like a fishing line, Daryl saw that there was a brick tied to the end of it. After Rick examined the rope he looped a knot in it where it was wet. He pointed at another knot. It was the first one, the furthest away from the brick. "This is how high the water was the day you left," he explained. He pointed at the second knot, and so on. "This is three days ago, two days, yesterday, and today."

Daryl frowned and took the rope into his own calloused hands. "Just under three feet. The water went down by three feet in just five days?"

Rick nodded. "The Judge – I mean, Greg – noticed it first. Don't suppose you saw beavers building a dam upstream?"

Daryl shook his head. "If I had, we'd be eating beavers for supper. What do we do?"

Rick shrugged. "Keep an eye on it."

"That's whatchin', not doin'."

"We probably just need a good rain."

"Hope so." Daryl used his hand to block the sun from his eyes as he surveyed the two-acre property. "Don't want to lose our moat full of fish and drinking water…"

The next morning, Rick rose with the sun. Three shirts – _clean_ shirts – hung in his closet and for once, his gun was on the bedside table instead of under his pillow. When he opened his bedroom door he saw a cracked dry-erase board on the floor with " _The Eden Examiner_ by Carl Grimes" written at the top. Rick found his son sitting at the dining room table with a textbook in his lap and Judy crawling in figure-8's around his legs. "What's this?" he asked, holding up the board.

Carl wore a black and navy plaid shirt and loose-fitting jeans. "I need help finishing my homework."

Rick scooped up a cooing Judy with one arm, sat across the table from Carl, and perused the three columns of writing on the board. "Is this a newspaper?"

Carl nodded. "Carol's assignment from English class. We're supposed to write about current events."

Rick pinched shut a button that had come undone on Judy's pink shirt. She poked at it, trying to mimic him. He kissed her, and then laid his temple against her brown-red hair as he read his first newspaper headlines in two and a half years:

 **Red Tower Welcomes Two New Arrivals**

 **Michonne Proposes New Security Ideas to Council**

 **Hunting Party Returns with Chipmunks, Leeks, and Chocolate**

 **Green Tower ACDC Tribute Band Recruits Piccolo and Accordion Players**

 **Hugh and Bill West Voted in as Blue Tower Supervisors**

 **Carol Peletier Tortures Students with Dumb Homework Assignments**

Rick looked up at that one. "I don't think Carol will give you an "A" for that," he chuckled.

Carl spoke around the celery stick he was nibbling on. "Oh, I saw her at breakfast this morning. She said to tell you that Maggie and Penelope are sick."

Rick scooped a red apple out of a basket in the middle of the table. "What's wrong with them?"

Carl shrugged. "Maggie was throwing up. Carol said those two shared the same rabbit leg last night. Think it's food poisoning."

"All right. I'll try to go visit them sometime this afternoon." Rick found another interesting headline on the newspaper and read it aloud: " _Sheriff Grimes Outlaws School – Kids Rejoice_. You trying to tell me something, son?"

Carl grinned with a mouthful of half-chewed green strands. "To make my newspaper authentic, I should get a direct quote from you. What do you want the public to know about this bold decision, Sheriff?"

Judy giggled both at Carl's green teeth and her father's smirk. "Well, you can quote me on this, son," Rick began. "I, Rick Grimes, support our council's decision to require mandatory school for all children under age 18."

Carl uncapped his dry-erase marker, turned the board around and started writing. "I, Rick Grimes," he said aloud as he scribbled, "realized that grades are meaningless right now because nobody's going to college to be an architect, and I've decided that the one super-cool thing about the world ending was that my son gets to spend his days hunting squirrels with Daryl instead of doing lame science experiments with Glenn."

Rick lightly flicked the rim of Carl's hat. "Smart ass."

Carl spread his palms. "There! You called me smart! Why do I need to go to school if I'm already smart?"

Rick rolled his eyes. "I need you to be a good example for the other kids, Carl."

Carl sighed. "Being your son is like being the principal's kid! The others already think I'm the teachers' pet. Miriam always makes me pretend to be the wounded dude in First Aid and Tara calls on me in art class even when I don't raise my hand."

"It's a tough world, buddy," Rick kidded. He looked back over his right shoulder at the third bedroom. "Is Antonio already outside?"

"I checked on him, but he said he isn't feeling well. Looked pretty pale."

The hair on the back of Rick's neck perked up. "Does he have the same symptoms as Maggie and Penelope?"

"Don't know."

"Carl, if they're sick because of something that happened on the hunting trip…"

"They aren't," Carl said. "I mean, Maggie wasn't even on the trip with us so that can't be why."

Rick hummed to himself. "Check in on him before you go to the picnic table for lunch, will you? And would you mind dropping Judy off at daycare on your way to class?"

Carl took his baby sister into his suntanned arms. She stuck her tongue out at him. It was her new favorite game. "You can stop asking me that, Dad, I do it every morning no matter what."

Rick helped Carl gather up his scattered school supplies: two pencils, a green marker, a purple crayon, half of a spiral notebook and a weathered copy of _To Kill a Mockingbird_. "It's the polite thing to say, Carl. Maybe I'll tell the council that we should have an etiquette class."

"Yeah, Daryl can teach it," Carl laughed. The three of them walked into the hall, skipped down four flights of stairs, and exited the Red Tower into the sun's spotlight.

Rosita knew something was wrong when Arty failed to flirt with her. They were on weed-pulling duty in the west garden that morning. The winter squash and Brussels sprouts were maturing quicker than they expected, and Rosita calculated that they could pick the whole crop in another seventy-two hours. Every once in a while, she rubbed her thumb and forefinger against the blue FORD keychain hanging from her belt loop. It was nearly lunchtime when Rosita finally decided to confront Arty. He sat against one of the water barrels in the section of the garden that was still in the Green Tower's shadow. As she approached him, a man she didn't recognize squatted down in front of him and gave him a cup of water. Rosita couldn't help but give the man a quick look over. He had cropped red hair, a tall basketball player's build, sharp cheekbones, mismatched sneakers, and long baggy shorts. While Arty, like so many other men, tended to become instantly clumsy around women like Rosita, this stranger's posture was self-assured and suave. "You must be Rosita," he greeted in a deep voice when she got within earshot. The man introduced himself as Jake and shook her hand.

"Welcome to Eden," Rosita said with a smile that pulled so far on the corners of her eyes that she could barely see. "As you can see we're all workaholics." Rosita cocked an eyebrow down at Arty and folded her arms against her chest. "Arty here has pulled two, maybe two and a half weeds all morning. _Wow_!"

Ignoring Rosita's sarcasm, Arty drank Jake's water like a shot and wiped his forehead with his shirt collar. "Rosa-Rosito," he said, using the nickname he'd given her, "I hate to say it, darlin', but I ain't feeling so hot. Well, actually, I'm feeling _too_ hot."

Rosita rolled her eyes. "It's Georgia, genius. The state itself is melting from the heat."

"I mean it, darlin,'" Arty continued. He dunked his cup in the barrel and dumped the water down his shirt. "I think I have a fever. And I'm all achy and dizzy and this time it isn't because of you."

Jake made an "I'm impressed" face. "The man managed to turn a list of symptoms into a compliment. Might be a keeper, Rosita." He winked at her, and Rosita felt her cheeks warm up.

"Take the afternoon off," Rosita ordered. She held out her hands and pulled Arty to his feet. "Want me to send Miriam to you?"

Arty swayed just for a moment, but it was long enough to alarm Jake, who grabbed the other man's shoulder. "Actually, I think I'll head to her right now," Arty said. "I might puke."

Rosita raised her hands and took two steps back. "I'll get him there," Jake said. He took Arty's elbow and led him towards the Red Tower. "See ya later, Rosa-Rosito."

"Rosa-Rosito!" said a new voice behind her. Rosita turned to see Tara walking over. "I like that. Can I use that?"

"Please don't," Rosita begged. "Are you having lunch with us?"

Tara shook her head. "I just dropped by the courtyard to grab a snack. Therese didn't turn up for her shift at the daycare so I'm filling in." Tara shrugged. "I don't mind. It's not like I have anything better to do at the moment. Plus, I'm trying to teach Judy to say my name." The girls parted ways.

The courtyard in the center of the three towers was getting crowded as everyone gathered for lunch. Since the line for the food wasn't worth standing in, it was so long, Rosita bypassed it and sauntered over to the area in front of the Blue Tower that had half a dozen picnic tables. She arrived at the table where Rick, Carl, and Carol were sitting right when Michonne showed up. "You guys seen Louie?" Michonne asked. She tossed her sword under the table and straddled the bench. "He was supposed to meet me for weapons training, but he never showed up."

"Is he that soft spoken guy with the hummingbird tattoos?" Rick asked around a mouthful of cauliflower.

"I thought they were sparrows," said Carol.

"Tara said that Therese is missing, too," Rosita told Michonne.

Rick suddenly dropped his fork. Everyone jumped when it rattled against his plate. "Those two were in the hunting party, right, Carl?" Carl was in the middle of swallowing some chocolate pudding, so he just nodded. "Are they sick?"

Both Michonne and Rosita shrugged. "Arty is," Rosita informed him. "He just went to Miriam's a minute ago."

"He was…" Rick turned to Carol. "We should check on them. And on Antonio and Penelope. If five of the people who were in that party are sick, that's a pattern. And that means there's a problem."

Carl gulped down the rest of his dessert. " _Dad_. Louie, Therese, Antonio, Penelope, and Arty are five of the six people who got bit by those dogs!"

" _Shit_." Rick got to his feet.

"What about Maggie?" Carol sputtered. "She's tired and faint and vomiting, too, but she certainly didn't get bit by anything!"

On cue, as if her ears were burning, Maggie came skipping over hand in hand with Glenn. They were both grinning from ear to ear – Maggie with a pleased smile and Glenn with a nervous one. "You guys, I'm not sick!" she said. "I mean, I am sick, but now we know why. I'm—"

Glenn couldn't wait. " _ **Pregnant**_!"

* * *

Daryl woke up in a pool of his own sweat with shards of glass centimeters from his face. He lay face down on his kitchen floor. Judging by the angle of the sunlight it was either late morning or early afternoon. The last thing he remembered was coming home after supper and pouring himself a glass of water. That glass shattered and scattered when he nosedived. Groaning, Daryl sat up with his back against his empty refrigerator. He flicked pieces of glass off his skin like they were mosquitoes. Getting up was harder than it should've been thanks to the dog bite on his ankle. Yesterday it ached, but today it stung. Curious, Daryl tugged on his pant leg. As the denim went up, so did the bandage. It hung, stuck to his skin for a moment before the weight of the blood soaked through it caused it to fall to the floor. "Aw, shit," Daryl growled when he saw the yellow-green puss oozing from the wound.

A scream exploded from the hallway. The thunder of stampeding feet coming down the nearby staircase echoed through the entire first floor of the Green Tower. Daryl's apartment was the first one inside the front door. No longer were the living arrangements determined by seniority. Those who were the most vulnerable – orphans, elderly, disabled, inexperienced – none of them were on the first floors of the tower anymore. The first floors were for men and women like Daryl Dixon. People who could take care of themselves and others. People who were the best first line of defense if the towers were ever infiltrated. But from the sound of it, there was trouble on the upper floors, not the first.

Daryl grabbed his knife and crossbow and limped out into the hallway. People rushed by too fast to hear his questions, so he grabbed a teenage boy's elbow and shouted at him, "What's going on?"

The kid was so out of breath that all he could do was point up the stairs, hold up three fingers and snap his teeth. Walkers. Daryl shouldered his weapons and started to climb.

" _ **Pregnant**_! Maggie's pregnant!" Glenn clamped his hands on either side of his face. "Isn't this great news?" Both held out their arms to accept the forthcoming hugs.

Rick raked dirty fingernails through his sweaty hair. "That's the _worst_ news!" Maggie and Glenn's grins deflated. "We definitely need to quarantine everyone from the hunting party who got bit."

"Bit by dogs," Carl explained when Glenn and Maggie gasped.

"You said Antonio, Penelope, Arty, Louie, and Therese are five of the six," Carol reminded Carl. "Who's number six?"

Carl hung his head. "Daryl."

Carol swung her leg over the picnic bench and stood up. "Has anyone seen him this morning? Has anyone seen him since supper last night?"

Maggie rubbed her lower stomach. "Rick, what's going on?"

"People are sick. I have a theory but all we know right now is that they were bit by dogs and now they're sick. Some are missing and could be…" Rick bit his lower lip, and then started firing off orders in quick succession. "Glenn, grab the security teams and tell everyone to lock themselves in their apartments. Carl, lock Antonio in his bedroom until one of us comes for you. Rosita, go straight to Tara and let her know what's going on so that they can protect the kids. Carol, go find Arty and warn Miriam to get the infirmary ready. Michonne, you get Louie and Maggie, you get Therese. I'll get Dar—"

Suddenly people started pouring out of the Green Tower like a flood. Amongst the terrified shrieks, Rick heard a familiar key word: " _Biters_!"

Daryl raced up the stairs at full speed. After two flights he was winded, dizzy. Lifting his crossbow was like trying to pull a sword from stone, and his legs were sluggish like he was wading through a tar pit. Nothing looked out of the ordinary until he got to the fifth floor. Blood splatters decorated the stairwell. The world was tilting, so he missed the doorknob between the landing and the hallway when he reached for it. Daryl leaned against the railing and took several deep breaths, knowing that he couldn't help anyone if he fell on his ass. When he finally opened the door, he found two Walkers sharing a woman's stomach. He recognized them as Louie and Therese. Daryl just started to aim his crossbow when a third Walker stumbled out of an apartment. It lunged at Daryl, pushed him back through the door and pinned him against the railing. His knees started buckling, so he took out his knife and held it pointing upwards in his lap. When he slid to the floor, dragging the Walker with him, it slammed eyeball-first into the blade. Daryl kicked the body off him and it rolled down the stairs.

A figure climbing the stairs vaulted over the Walker rolling down it. The woman had red hair, black knee-high boots, leather pants, and a softball player's body: thick hips and strong arms. She wore a bright red bra under a see-through tank top. A small but wicked one-handed crossbow fired a bolt into Louie's face a second before he clamped his teeth onto Daryl's neck. "On your feet, Dixon," she ordered.

Daryl took her outstretched hand and let her pull him to his feet. "Who the hell are you and why do you know my name?" he wheezed.

"I'm the chick who just saved your ass," she said. "And I recognize you because, well, Rick said you were probably my type. Anymore Chompers?"

Daryl loaded a bolt into his own crossbow. "I got it." He shoved his way past the woman, stormed back into the hallway, and shot Therese through the ear.

"I'll check the other apartments," the woman said. She disappeared down the hall without looking back.

"Mmmm," Daryl muttered. He braced himself against the wall and wiped his arm across his sweaty forehead. His ankle throbbed. The pain distracted him so much that he didn't hear the voices calling his name until the third or fourth time. "Up here, Rick."

Rick burst into the hall with Carol on his heels. "Oh god, it's them," he gasped when he saw the skewered Walkers. "Must have died during the night."

"Are you hurt?" Carol asked.

"I'm fine," Daryl said automatically. His arm felt shaky, so he anchored his shoulder against the wall as he said, "Ankle, though. Passed out last night… I think that damn dog gave me rabies." Daryl shifted his weight so that his back was braced against the wall. He shut his eyes and pointed down the hallway. "Some chick's here. Spunky. Crossbow…" Before he even realized that he was falling, his butt hit the floor. Pain radiated up his body from the dog bite and Daryl groaned.

Sweaty, calloused hands touched his cheeks and forehead. "Shit, he definitely has a fever," Rick whispered. "Daryl, open your eyes. Try to stay awake."

Daryl obeyed. "Did I fall over?" he muttered.

Carol's petite hands fluttered across his skin. "Rick, we have to get his temperature down."

"Right." Rick wiped his palm down his face and neck. "We'll use the solar panel power to turn on the penthouse freezer. We need enough ice for Daryl, Antonio, and Penelope."

"What's wrong with them?" Daryl slurred. "Er… us?"

"Rick, you said you had a theory," Carol reminded him.

"He doesn't need to hear it!" Rick hissed so softly that Daryl barely caught it.

"Hey." Daryl tried to punch Rick in the chest but could barely raise his arm. "We talked about this. Don't hide stuff from me."

The sheriff sighed. "The virus, or whatever it is that makes Walkers, it's dormant in us and active in them." Rick's hand clamped behind the back of Daryl's neck. "I've seen starving dogs picking at Walkers. If the active virus was in a dog's mouth when it bit a human…"

"It's the same as getting bit by a Walker," Carol whispered. She reached out and combed her fingers through Daryl's hair. "They definitely have the symptoms: fever, fainting, weakness, dizziness, nausea… Soon they'll become delirious, start hemorrhaging blood…" Carol's sad sigh felt like a cool wind against Daryl's forehead.

Rick's hand was close to Daryl's on the floor, so the archer was able to grasp his wrist. "Different, though," he grunted. "Symptoms show up within hours. We were bit over a day and a half ago. Maybe… Does that mean it's weaker?"

Rick's face brightened. "Weaker, maybe – or maybe, just slower?" His face fell at that thought.

"Slower but the same result," Carol whispered, gesturing at the Walkers behind them.

Rick rested his chin on the crown of Daryl's head and massaged the back of his neck. "Either way, you can fight this, Daryl," he said.

"Mmm," Daryl mumbled. Something foggy settled behind his eyes and something heavy landed on his eyelids. They closed halfway. His body went limp and slumped against Rick's chest.

"Rick," Carol whispered, "nobody recovers from a bite. We might have to… Daryl would want us to…" She fingered the knife in her back pocket.

Daryl felt Rick's body tense. "Don't you dare. We're not there yet."

"I won't watch him suffer!" Carol squeaked.

" _I won't watch him die_!" Rick bellowed.

"Shut up, both of you…" Daryl grunted right before he passed out.

 _ **Glenn and Maggie**_

Glenn grabbed Maggie's elbow before she could follow Rick and Carol into the Green Tower. "We can handle it," he insisted. "Check on Penelope." He ran off before she could argue.

The Blue Tower was busy. Some people were running into their apartments, and others were going outside to see what all the commotion was about. Maggie opened Penelope's door without knocking. As she drew a breath to call her friend's name, the stench of vomit almost knocked her feet out from under her like a landslide. Maggie started towards the bedroom but something on the living room couch caught her eye. A ball of sea-green yarn sat on a pair of crisscrossed knitting needles. Beside them was a tiny knit booty the size of a pill bottle. Under that, a stained napkin had these words written in crayon: Ideas for Maggie's Baby Shower.

Penelope's almond eyes stared without seeing. She lay in her bed with her hands folded on her stomach as if a mortician had just arranged her limbs in a casket. Maggie could tell that she had been dead for hours, but the fever in her was so hot that the body remained warm. When Maggie kissed Penelope's forehead and whispered "Thank you," the body heat made it seem like she was still alive.

Maggie took out her knife.

 _ **Carl and Antonio**_

Carl almost ran right by Antonio on the Red Tower staircase. He caught the younger boy by the wrist and Antonio howled when Carl's fingers scratched his bandaged dog bite. "Why are you out of bed?" Carl demanded. "I thought you were sick!"

"What's going on?" Antonio yelled over the crowd of people passing them on the stairs. "Somebody said there were Chompers in Green!"

"My dad's taking care of it! Come on, let's go home."

"I'm feeling a lot better!" Antonio said right before he vomited on Carl's shoes.

 _ **Tara and Rosita**_

Judith had just settled down for a nap when Rosita barged into the daycare. Tara half-expected her. The daycare was in the Blue Tower basement and suddenly the whole building shook with people stampeding up and down the stairs. Rosita shoved the door open so hard and fast that the doorknob cracked the drywall. " _Walkers_!" Rosita hollered at Tara and the other babysitters. "Help me barricade the door!"

Tara sidestepped a pair of five-year-olds playing with blocks and a teary-eyed three-year-old wrist deep in Play-Doh. She grabbed a chair and dragged it to the door.

 _ **Miriam and Jake**_

Miriam Merriweather was the closest thing the Eden community had to a doctor after The Surgeon was killed. A combat medic, the thirty-year-old served two tours in Iraq, and thought that was the craziest shit she would ever see. But then the dead started strolling around, and she escaped the nearby Army base before it was overrun, and now she played physician to four hundred plus patients. She set up a permanent infirmary on floor one of the Red Tower. Medical supplies were so rare and so precious that Miriam kept them locked up in an apartment that only she had the key to. She was in that apartment, sorting hypodermic needles by size on the kitchen counter, when a man half-carried a half-conscious Arty into the room.

"Black hair, blue eyes, tattoo sleeves," the man said, listing off her physical description like they were symptoms, "you must be Miriam. I'm Jake."

Miriam gave him a polite nod. "Was there an accident in the garden?" she asked while leading Arty over to a bed.

Jake shook his head. "Don't know, but somebody out there is raving about Biters, so I'm going to leave him in your hands, doc."

"Don't call me 'doc.' 'Miriam' will do." Jake gave her a brief salute and jogged back outside.

 _ **Eloise and Cain**_

Miles away from Eden, Eloise Pierce was one giant grin. She stood on a wide tree stump with her legs spread apart and her gloved hands stuffed into her apron pockets. In the valley below, her cousins, nieces, and nephews dumped the final barrels of gravel on top of their makeshift dam made of mud and trees. After months of work, the Pierce family finally managed to completely stop the Eden River. Now the only thing that flowed down the riverbed was a thin trickle of mud.

John Cain, formerly The Serpent, stepped away from the celebrating Pierce's and joined The Matriarch. "I had my doubts about your plan," he confessed, "but now I see it clearly."

Eloise carefully climbed down from the stump, and then sat on it like it was a throne. "You said the same thing when we unleashed the infected mutts on that hunting party."

Cain scratched chin through his gray-white beard. "I had no doubt they would attack. You certainly starved them enough. But nobody was killed."

The Matriarch looked up at the sky and smiled back at the sun. "This morning I got word that at least four are dead from those bites."

"How do you—" Cain walked into her eye line. "You got one of your people into the Towers?"

The Matriarch held up both of her forefingers. "Two."

* * *

Daryl was dying. That was all that Michonne could think about. By this time tomorrow, he'll be dead.

It was well after midnight. Michonne watched the cracked green bucket of ice slowly descend from the thirtieth floor of the Red Tower into her arms on the first. Somewhere in the darkness above, Carol was leaning over the penthouse railing and slowly letting the line out like a fisherman. Michonne unhooked the bucket, tugged twice on the rope, and watched for a second as it rose back up into the dark stairwell. She carried the bucket across the hall and into one of the apartments set up as an infirmary. She tried, but didn't succeed in ignoring the bodies laid out flat on the floor, covered in white sheets. Arty had passed several hours before, but Antonio was surviving in one of the bedrooms. He was asleep, and achy, but his fever wasn't high. Miriam sat beside him and coaxed water down his throat every time he stirred. The door to the master bedroom was open. Dim lantern light revealed Carl, who was curled up awkwardly in a wooden rocking chair that seemed to shift its weight after each exhale. Although the master bathroom door was also ajar, Michonne knocked a forefinger against the wall before she entered. Rick sat on the edge of the large Whirlpool tub. He squinted past the faint light produced by three candles squatting on the counter, recognized Michonne, and waved her inside. Michonne set the bucket on the floor, dug out a small plastic cup, and handed it to Rick.

"Glenn boiled another gallon of water. He's refilling the ice cube trays," Michonne whispered.

Rick nodded. "Good." With his right hand he scooped up a cup of ice and slowly dropped the cubes into the tub, which was half-filled. Daryl lay in his black boxers on his back in the water, unconscious, his head above the surface only because Rick's left arm was supporting him. His breaths were shallow, and his skin was corpse-colored. Dried blood coated the insides of his nostrils.

Michonne counted to twenty, and then asked, "Do you need any more tonight?"

"Yes," Rick said immediately. "No, I mean… No." He refilled the cup and added more ice to the bath. "I mean I don't need any more for Daryl right now. Don't want the water too cold. Could throw him into shock."

"Should we start another shift? Keep boiling more drinking water, at least?"

"No," Rick said immediately. "Yes, I mean… Yes." Rick wiped the back of his hand across his nose and sniffed. "Jake and Rosita have been checking on the water levels. The river's going down by several centimeters an hour. We should… We need to…" Rick set the cup on the closed toilet lid and rubbed his eyes with cold, pruned fingertips. Michonne noticed that the plate of food Maggie left for Rick sat on an overturned trashcan, untouched. "We should fill every empty container on site with water. Just in case."

"All right," Michonne agreed. She watched Rick struggle to drop some ice cubes near Daryl's feet, but not on them, but he couldn't stretch his arm far enough. He jerked his shoulder, which nudged Daryl, and the unconscious man groaned and started to fidget. When Michonne decided to help, and reached for the ice, Rick recoiled from her. His body arced protectively over Daryl and he gave her a look typically reserved for Walkers. She held her hands up in surrender. "Rick, I'm not going to hurt him."

He blinked several times. "Sorry. I know. Sorry." Rick sighed deep in his chest. "I'm just – I'm just running on adrenaline." He turned his attention to Daryl and spoke hushed, cooing words. "You're ok," he whispered. "I've got you. You're safe." Daryl flinched, but didn't wake up.

"Maybe you should take a break."

" _No_ ," Rick said with a typical "and-that's-final" dad voice.

Michonne bit her lower lip. She almost got up to leave, but decided to push the issue. "Rick, you're exhausted. You haven't eaten. You won't be holding Daryl's head above the water if you nod off." Michonne continued when Rick didn't move. "Why don't we get some pillows or something to prop him up? Not that I would take my eyes off him – if you're worried that I'm not strong enough to handle—"

"He started hallucinating," Rick stated. "He gets in this half-asleep state and starts throwing punches. I need to make sure he doesn't hurt himself."

Michonne's eyebrows sunk downwards. Moving slowly, as if Rick was a feral animal likely to spring if threatened, Michonne put the cup back in the bucket and sat on the toilet lid with her hands folded in her lap. "Has he said anything?"

Rick dipped his fingers into the bath. He swirled his hand around to spread the cooler water evenly across Daryl's body. "I think…" he began, and continued only after another lengthy sigh. "I think he almost drowned when he was a kid. When he notices that he's underwater he gets really agitated. He tries to get up, I pin him back down and he seems to think I'm trying to hold him underwater." Rick gently pulled a few stray strands of Daryl's bangs away from his forehead, and it occurred to Michonne that gesture was the most intimate thing she'd ever witnessed Rick do. "Then he… He starts yelling for Merle. Says things like 'I can't swim!' and 'This ain't funny!' and 'Don't let them kill me!'" Rick's nostrils flared with emotion while the rest of his face remained motionless.

Michonne suddenly itched for her sword as if she could swing it into the past and behead those asshole kids for what they did to her friend. "How do you get him calmed down?"

Rick's nose scrunched up. "Talk to him. Eventually he looks at me… He assumes… Maybe I should correct him, feels like I'm tricking him, but it's not like he'll even remember…"

"He thinks you're Merle."

"Yeah," Rick said. "And I let him. Nothing else pacifies him. At first, I didn't realize that he wasn't recognizing me. I called him 'brother.' I've called him that before. Didn't even occur to me that he heard that word and went straight to Merle. Stupid of me…"

"He's delirious." Michonne sensed that Rick needed forgiveness, even though he hadn't done anything wrong. "It's more important that you keep him safe, keep his heartrate down, keep him calm. If that's what must be done, then do it. It's for his own good." Rick nodded. "Have you checked his temperature recently?"

"Yeah. It's still going up. Not as fast since we got him in the water, but it's still moving."

"What is it?"

"104," Rick whispered. "104… point 9." Suddenly he made a fist and pressed his forehead against it, then his nose, and then his lips before resting his chin on top. "We're going to lose him, this time, aren't we?"

"Don't," Michonne said, and her voice cracked in the middle of the word. "Don't you _mourn_ him, Rick." Rick rubbed his eyes.

Michonne wanted to pull Rick's face to her shoulder and press her cheek against his. She wanted to tell him that he was being ridiculous, that he was worrying for no reason, that if anyone in the whole world could survive a Walker bite, watered down or full-strength, it was Daryl. She didn't know for sure if that hope was a lie, but it tasted like one. The thought was sour, rotten. Because she didn't trust herself to say anything more, Michonne said nothing. Instead, she scooped up another cup of ice and gently released the cubes into the water. Then, she leaned past Rick, closed her eyes and placed a gentle kiss on Daryl's searing forehead.

Rick avoided her eyes. Keeping his left hand cushioned behind Daryl's neck, he slid to the blue tiled floor, braced his right arm against the lip of the tub, and sunk his face into the soft skin on the inside of his elbow. Michonne watched this, expressionless. She steepled her fingers beneath her chin and stared at one of the candles.

She wasn't sure how much time passed, so she didn't know how long Daryl was awake before she noticed. Movement in her peripheral vision turned out to be blinking eyes and when she saw that Daryl's eyes were open, she almost leapt to her feet. It was the look on Daryl's face that made her stay still. His eyes had a blurred, almost velvety texture to them. Soft. Gentle. _Adoring_. A petite smile perched on the corner of his white lips. She'd seen that expression before, but it was rare, and normally 100% reserved for Judith. Daryl stared at Rick's motionless form, then frowned at something invisible beyond Rick's shoulder, exhaled a long sigh, shut his eyes, and went still.

 _Too_ still.

Michonne felt like a fist of brass knuckles strangled her heart. "Daryl?" she said. " _Daryl_?"

Rick looked up when she reached over his head and pressed the back of her palm to the archer's nose and mouth. "What is it?"

Michonne counted to 20 and then reported, "He's not breathing!"

Rick cursed. "Grab his feet!" he ordered. "Help me get him on the floor!"

Carl heard his father's shouts in his sleep, and he was so startled that he promptly tossed himself out of his rocking chair. He sprinted to the bathroom. The scene inside paralyzed him the second he stepped over the threshold. A soaking wet Daryl lay flat on the floor. Michonne's mouth was pressed against his as she exhaled breaths into his lungs. Rick's fingers were laced together, and the heel of his hand made Daryl's chest bounce up and down as he tried to restart his heart.

"Anything?" Rick shouted at Michonne.

Her ear went to Daryl's lips. "No," she said through a sob. "Oh, God, Rick, what do we do?"

"Keep trying!" Rick bellowed. He started the compressions up again, and Carl nearly puked when he heard one of Daryl's ribs crack. "Come on, Daryl," Rick wheezed. "Not yet. Come on – not like this - not yet!"

Something deep and unnamed within Carl snapped. He was out the door and down the hall long before he even realized he was moving. The teenager ran out of the tower, through the empty courtyard, north across the bridge as the sun started to rise on his right, past the bulldozer, past a tree marked with the circled "X," and onward into the forest. He ran until he was out of breath, and then he ran some more. When a Walker stumbled out from behind a boulder, Carl didn't even break stride as he stabbed its brain. Legs aching, sun fully in the sky, tears dried to salt on his cheeks, Carl finally turned around and started running back the way he came, following his own footprints. How long had Daryl been dead now – an hour? Two hours? What did he look like? Was his face frozen in pain? Were his lips blue? Where would they bury him? What would his headstone say? Was Antonio gone, too?

He'd just spotted the yellow color of the bulldozer through the trees when he heard the footsteps. Carl crouched, making his body as small and still as possible, just like Daryl taught him. And just like Daryl taught him, his knife was still in his grip while he looked for the source of the sound with one eye, and a place to hide with the other. They seemed to be coming towards him from every direction, so without any further debate, Carl reached up for the nearest tree branch and started to climb. The oak tree hid him just in time.

The Pierce family copied Eugene's idea and made catapults out of camping tents. Mobile catapults on small wooden wagons, supported by crutches and ski poles, pulled taunt by bungee cords. Carl counted eight people in the first wave - eight men who set up their weapons two or three trees away from the clearing between the woods and the river. Twelve more people came through the woods dragging barrels, shopping carts, and plastic containers. Once the catapults were ready, they started emptying the carts.

Carl put his hand across his mouth to stifle his cry of shock when he saw what the catapult ammo was.

 _Heads_.

There were heads. Walker heads. A hundred of them. Decapitated from the rest of their bodies, but with their brains still intact, the heads were just chomping teeth – black tongues flicking out to get a taste of the fresh flesh lifting them by their hair.

Five catapults were loaded with five heads each. The Matriarch appeared on a horse like a general from the Civil War. That's what this was, Carl realized with a start. A civil war. Carl had freed their slaves, and now the plantation owners wanted revenge. The Dead Herders had guns, but left them leaning against the trees. In this war, there were Walker heads instead of cannonballs.

Carl could only watch, helpless, as twenty-five snapping Walker heads suddenly sailed out of the forest and crashed into the courtyard where the Eden families had just sat down for breakfast.

* * *

Daryl Dixon was neither dead nor dreaming. He was certain of that, just like he was certain that the wind existed even though he'd never seen it. His question to the universe was this: if he wasn't dead, and he wasn't dreaming, then why was he standing on the splintered wooden dock of a lake that he hadn't seen in fifteen years? Why were dragonflies and horseflies zipping around lily pads and cattails? Why were his nostrils filled with the familiar Georgian scents of heat, water, mud, and mold? Skin sunburned, sweat on his upper lip, hair short, a breeze down the back of his t-shirt, wearing cut-off jeans and bare feet… Suddenly, a petite hand slipped into his and braided their fingers together. "You almost died here," said a wind chime of a voice. "Your brother saved you."

" _Beth_ ," Daryl whispered. There she was. Beside him. The angle of the sunlight made her blonde hair look like a halo. One fat, hot tear tiptoed down his skin. He yanked her into a hug and pressed a chaste kiss to her cheek.

Beth squeezed him just as hard. "Told you you'd miss me."

"You were right," he told her. "You were right about a lot of things." They parted. Daryl held the teen at arm's length and examined her. Beth wore the same clothes she died in, but there were no wounds, no blood. "What the hell's going on?"

"You're dying. Subconsciously, you've _decided_ to die," Beth clarified. She gently swiped Daryl's hair out of his eyes. "I'm here to help you, Daryl… You stopped fighting."

Daryl winced as if Beth's words were a bee sting. "I got bit – infected. Nobody can fight that."

Beth chuckled. "'I was nobody,'" she quoted him. "You told me that's who you were. So, you _can_ fight it, Mr. Nobody." She stood straight and cocked her chin. "You got a diluted dose of the active virus, Daryl. It won't inevitably kill you. You can choose to live."

Daryl ducked his head. "Even if I could… why should I? It's hell."

She curled a forefinger beneath his chin and pushed his face up to meet her sparkling eyes. "They need you," she whispered. "Rick, Judith… Your family needs you, Daryl."

"They'd be better off without me," he insisted. "All I'm good for is shootin' squirrels. Only thing I do other than that is attract trouble. It would be better if… if I'd died before I even met them."

Beth blinked slowly. Her smile grew. "That's why I'm here. You don't have the will to fight, Daryl, because you're convinced that the people you love would be better off if you were never born."

Daryl snorted. "That's what you think?"

That earned him a punch on the arm. "That's what I know." They shared a knowing smile at their inside joke. "You listen to me, Daryl Dixon," Beth said. "You listen close. Merle should've died on that rooftop in Atlanta. You know what motivated him to free himself? Getting back to you. And Carol, Carol would've killed herself if you weren't there to comfort her when she lost Sophia. And how many people would've escaped the farm if you hadn't helped? That rough winter… Laurie would've died if you hadn't brought her squirrels. Judith would've died the same day she was born if you hadn't found formula." Daryl ran his fingers through his hair so hard that he scraped his scalp. Beth continued her list. "You saved Glenn and Maggie in Woodbury. When people got the flu, you got the medicine. If not for you, the Claimers would've killed Rick, Michonne, and Carl. If not for you, nobody would've escaped Terminus."

Daryl's stomach dropped, and then did a series of acrobatic loop-de-

loops. "What about you?" he whispered. "I fail—" he choked, "I failed you."

Beth stood on her tiptoes and kissed his forehead. "I should've died in the prison. I should've died a hundred times in the woods, Daryl. That time we spent together… I watched you. I learned from you. You gave me the courage to confront Dawn, to help Noah. When I died, _I died a better person._ And you… You won't die here, Daryl," Beth said. "Listen. Listen for his voice. Your brother is trying to save you."

A voice, an echo in the distance, shouted, " _Daryl_!"

Daryl pivoted around, searching for the source. "Rick?"

Louder echoes: _"Come on, Daryl. Not yet. Come on!"_

His attention flickered between the horizon and Beth. "Not yet?" he asked her.

She shook her head. "Not yet."

" _Daryl_!"

"You said… You said I'm going to be the last man standing. That ain't what I want. I don't wanna dig Rick's grave."

"It doesn't matter," Beth whispered, "whether you're the next or the last, because in the end, we'll all be together again."

" _ **DARYL**_!"

" _Rick_!" He started running – in every direction at once – leaving the lake behind, leaving his guilt and insecurity behind, leaving Beth to wait patiently for him just a little while longer…

One second, Daryl Dixon's heart was frozen, and his skin was corpse-gray. The next, his eyes burst open bright and blue and he gasped, "C-c-c-cold."

Rick's forehead lay against Daryl's sternum. The sudden punch of his friend's newly beating heart startled him straight up onto his knees. His jaw dropped, then snapped shut and quivered. Michonne gasped and staggered back against the bathroom wall. "How..." Rick whispered. He rubbed his eyes as if chasing away a lingering dream. His fingers trembled hummingbird-fast. "I don't..."

Daryl blinked up at him. "Cold," he repeated, teeth chattering. " _Cold_."

" _Daryl_." Rick's wide eyes were watery. "Can you - come on, put your arms around my neck. That's it." With Michonne's help, Rick stood with Daryl in a bridal carry and took him over to the bed. Michonne pulled back the covers and then started yanking blankets out of dresser drawers like a magician tugging scarves out of her sleeve. Rick lay Daryl on his side and the archer immediately folded into a fetal position. Shivers like seizures shot through him so hard that his muscles ached. Rick retrieved some towels. He dried Daryl off as much as he could, but his black hair soaked up the moisture and held on. Adding half a dozen blankets helped a little. Daryl's limbs acted less like they were being repeatedly struck by lightning and more like muscles just twitching.

Michonne rolled into the bed. She spooned against Daryl's back and started rubbing his arms and chest while Rick focused on his legs. At least half an hour passed before Daryl's chattering teeth stilled. He looked like a child with his curious, unfocused eyes peeking out over a mountain of blankets and Michonne petting his hair with a mother's touch. Rick sat on the side of the bed with his hands clamped together. When the drowsiness faded from his eyes, Daryl snaked one ice-cold hand out from under the covers and grabbed Rick's. "Where's Beth?" he whispered.

Rick and Michonne exchanged uncertain looks. "He's still delirious," Rick whispered.

"Won't be for long. His fever broke," Michonne reported. She pressed the back of her hand against Daryl's cheeks, forehead, and neck.

Daryl's eyes started to slide shut, so Rick patted his cheek softly but firmly. "Stay awake," he ordered. "Don't close your eyes, Daryl."

Daryl swatted a limp hand at him like he was a fly. "Go ta' hell, Merle…"

Michonne shook her head in wonder. "Rick, I thought he was gone." Rick said nothing. His Adam's apple bounced like a basketball. "I'll go find his clothes."

Rick coughed against his sleeve. "I have them here. Could you check on Carl, maybe? And the others - tell the others."

"Gladly." Michonne gave Daryl a final squeeze before she left.

A few minutes later, Carol entered the room with Judith cushioned against her hip. "Rick," she said, "I thought you might want to hear this."

Rick stood and took his daughter into his arms. "Hear what?" he asked.

In the middle of his question, Judith squeaked, "Dd-ie!"

Rick blinked at her. "Is she…" He swallowed a lump in his throat the size of a baseball.

Judith tried again. "Dah-dee."

"Daddy," Rick said, pronouncing each syllable clearly. "Da-ddy."

Judy bounced happily. "Dad-eeeeeee!" She clapped her hands together and he covered her cheeks with kisses.

Carol sat on the bed beside Daryl. She winced when he called her "Beth." Judith must have heard Daryl's gravelly voice because she swiveled around in her dad's arms and looked down at the bed. Her grin doubled in size and she reached her arms out. " _Dare_!" Carol gasped and put her hand against her mouth. "Dare!" Judy repeated. "Dare – Dare – Dare!" Daryl's eyes rolled around in their sockets several times before settling on Judith. Rick immediately knelt beside the bed and propped Judy up on the mattress. Pudgy pink fingers bumped against Daryl's lips, then found his hair and tugged. Suddenly, Judith rolled herself forward and slammed her face into the space between Daryl's chin and shoulder. She cooed as she rubbed her skin against his and petted his neck.

A fog appeared to lift from Daryl's eyes. He squinted and blinked at the baby, and something in her drew him back to reality. "Hey, sweetheart," he whispered. "There's our baby girl…" Carol interlaced her fingers with Rick's and squeezed. Daryl pulled his arm out from under the comforter and wrapped it around Judy. He rolled her hand between his fingers like it was a stress ball. She giggled when he tickled her under the chin. Minutes passed before he looked around the room and made eye contact with Rick and Carol.

"Do you recognize us?" Rick asked gently.

Daryl rolled his eyes. "No, Rick."

"Thank God," Carol whispered.

Rick checked Daryl's pulse and confirmed that the fever had diminished. "How long was I gone?" Daryl whispered.

Rick forced himself to swallow. "You've been unconscious for a day and a half."

Daryl watched the minute muscles twitching in his friend's face. "Rick, I mean, how long was I _gone_?" he asked.

Rick shook his head back and forth. He fisted away a tear before it could fall to his cheek. "How do you feel?" he asked, sort of changing the subject.

Daryl smiled when Judy found his facial hair and clawed at it, curious. "Awake." Daryl thought about it for a long minute. "Strong." He wiggled under the blankets. Scooting up to sit back against the headboard winded him a little bit, but didn't weaken him. "Smells like sunrise." Daryl snuggled his nose against Judith's short hair. "Or is that you, sweetheart?"

She smiled. " _Dare_!"

* * *

Rick and Carol just finished helping Daryl get dressed in dark jeans and a sleeveless black shirt when a Walker head burst through the bedroom window. All three arched their bodies over Judith, creating a tent to protect her from the shattered glass. The room resembled a pinball machine when the head bounced off the bed, rebounded off the dusty ceiling fan and ricocheted off the wall. At each impact it left behind clumps of hair, rotted teeth, and a tongue. It rolled, jaws snapping, under Rick's heel, and he squashed it like a bug. Shrieks began to fill the whole compound as more skulls rained down on the towers. Daryl nodded at Rick. The sheriff nodded back, and he and Carol sprinted for the door while Daryl stayed with the baby.

"Duck!" Carol yelled when a pair of heads nearly clobbered them the second they stepped outside. The courtyard was beyond hectic. Edenites of every age were running, diving under picnic tables, and chasing rolling skulls with machetes and baseball bats. Glenn and Maggie came running out of the Green Tower using a black umbrella as a shield.

Michonne ran over – stopping only to skewer half a dozen heads with her sword like shish kabob. "What the hell is going on?" she shouted.

Tara stuck her head out of a broken window on the third floor of the Red Tower and pointed north. "The bridge!" she shouted down at them. "There are a ton of people out there!" She took out a tennis racket and swatted away a spinning skull.

" _Shit_ ," Rick hissed. He faced his troops and started shouting orders. "Get everyone inside! Open the armory, distribute every weapon we've got. Snipers on the roofs! Tell—"

"Ambassador." The voice echoed off the buildings and rattled in and out of Rick's ears. A figure on a limping brown horse stood on the bridge and boomed through a megaphone, "Send an ambassador."

Rick swallowed twice, looked around for Daryl and, after remembering that his second-in-command wasn't there, met Michonne's eyes. "Don't go alone," she whispered.

The sheriff licked his chapped lips. "Stay here," he said. "When I give the signal, open fire on them."

"What's the signal?" asked Maggie.

"Me diving into the creek bed so I don't get a bullet in the brain."

Glenn took two walkie-talkies and a brown rubber band out of his jacket pocket. He turned the devices on, double-checked that they were on the same channel, and then handed it to Rick. "Put the rubber band around the talk button," he instructed. "Hide it in your pocket. We'll hear everything. We'll come running if you need."

Rick nodded. "I know." He clapped Glenn on the shoulder. "I'll be right back."

"Be careful," Maggie begged. She nudged a severed head and sent it spinning like a top. "Whoever these assholes are, they're sadistic."

Rick was halfway to the bridge when he recognized the Pierce's matriarch on the horse. The aging woman still wore her stained white apron and when the breeze shifted, Rick caught a whiff of stale oatmeal. Expressionless, eyes rimmed red, she glared at Rick like he was shit under her shoes. Rick returned the scowl. His throat was dry, and he sweated through his shirt in just the time it took to walk to the bridge. At least 20 faces watched the scene from the tree line. Rick recognized Cain peeking over the bulldozer.

"It's the Pierce's," Rick said quietly but loud enough for the others to hear him through the walkie-talkie. "The Dead Herders found us." To The Matriarch he said, with faux politeness, "Can I help you?"

She wiped her nose, coughed twice, and spat at Rick's boots. "I remember your face," she said, looking everywhere but into his eyes. "Mr. Stupid. You must be Rick. Where's that dark-haired friend of yours with the biker vest? Daryl, right?"

Rick glanced at Cain. "I'm Rick Grimes," he said. "I'm the sheriff of this community. Daryl and eight other archers have crossbows aimed at your hearts. 30 snipers are ready to take you out if you launch one more head at us. We outnumber you a dozen to one—"

"How long can people live without water?" The Matriarch asked. She picked at dirt on a fingernail. "Three, right? Three days?" Rick didn't reply. "After we dammed up the river – worked hard as beavers – we spent our nights putting mines all around the woods. You send out a hunting party, a scavenging party, a _birthday_ party, Mr. Stupid, and they'll be in pieces too small to fill a toddler biter's tummy. And if you take a stroll up the dry creek you'll run into a pack of dogs you won't escape. You hear me, Mr. Stupid? You hear?"

Rick resisted the temptation to turn and search for his friends' eyes. "You – you infected those dogs? Fed them Walker flesh?" The Matriarch's eyes shone proud in the dawn sun. "You bomb us with biters, stop our pipes, turn our forest into a minefield… The hell do you want?"

"Three days," the woman said again. "I'll give ya'll three days, then we'll be back."

Movement in the trees caught Rick's eye. He struggled to keep them from widening comically when he recognized his son. Carl was three-quarters of the way up a tree, right behind the catapults.

If Rick gave the order to attack, Carl could get shot. Again.

"Back for what?" Rick demanded.

"You." The Matriarch flexed the horse's reins. It snorted, then started trotting backwards. "Daryl, Michonne, Carl, all of you. Every single one of you, Rick. You assholes destroyed my plantation and killed my family. You turn yourselves in, and I promise we'll unstop the river and remove the mines. Surrender, and the rest of these fine folks get to live."

It was past difficult for Rick to keep himself from looking at Carl. If The Matriarch's threats were true, it was a miracle he was safely up in that tree instead of launched up there by a landmine. "And if we refuse?"

The Matriarch spread her arms out, palms up, and a single laugh cracked through her yellow teeth. "Really, Mr. Stupid? You're gonna make me state the obvious? Fine." She took a deep breath and unleashed a spine-curling scream, " _You're all dead_!"

"Don't fire," Rick whispered to the walkie-talkie. "You'll hit Carl. Don't fire."

The Matriarch held up three fingers. "Three days," she said again. "See you in three days, Mr. Stupid." She dropped two fingers. The third was her middle one, which she shoved at Rick. Rick waited patiently until the whole battalion retreated. Even when they were out of sight, he didn't move until the horse's loud clip-clops faded.

Carl was sliding down the tree when Rick reached him. He caught his son and held him like he was a young boy again. Carl didn't wiggle, or even argue. Arms around his father's neck, Carl held still and silent as Rick carried him back up to the towers.

They burned the dismembered Walker heads in the swimming pool.

The chickens, rabbits and pigs were moved from their big pen to the pump house. Half the gas was siphoned out of the rusting bulldozer and sprinkled across the chipped, peeling blue paint. Diamond-shaped, four to eight feet deep and situated in the center of the courtyard between the three Towers of Eden, the flame-filled pool appeared to turn night into day. For some of the Edenites, throwing the heads into the fire became a game. They competed to see who could toss a head the highest. A few gathered on a tenth floor balcony and launched the skulls into the fire from there. Others set up plastic cups like bowling pins and cheered louder depending on how many a rolling head knocked down.

It was an untimely revelry. The energy was manic, not joyful. Inappropriate considering most of the day was spent burying dead bodies, shutting up broken windows, and scrubbing blood off bedroom floors. More than anything it was sparked by impatience. The Council had been in session all evening while everyone else had to wait.

When the sheriff and the rest of the Council emerged from the penthouse, the whole crowd went silent. People sat on the picnic tables, in lawn chairs, on the grass and sidewalks and on the dry pits of mulch beneath the first story windows. 400+ people couldn't fit in the courtyard all at once, so those who lived in the apartments facing the burning pool opened their windows and balconies. As Rick climbed up onto a rickety wooden chair in front of the entrance to the Red Tower he thought of the speech he gave back at the Pierce Plantation. Back then there were a hundred people in that old barn. People sitting on hay bales, squatting on straw, leaning against rolls of chicken wire and dangling their feet from the loft. He smiled when some of those same faces looked back at him there in the courtyard. They'd wanted to escape that barn—escaping was what Rick's speech was all about. This time his speech would be about staying. Not just because wild dogs and landmines trapped them there, but because the Eden Towers had become their home.

Rick took a deep breath and faced the crowd. Wide eyes stared back. The whole forest was silent save for the snap-crackling flames. "Raise your hand," he called, "if you can hear me." Rick stretched his neck left, and then right, looking all around to make sure that nobody was left out. "My friends," he began, then sighed and stared down at his boots. Rick wiped his nose and then put his hands on his hips. "We lost 14 good people in the past two days." He glanced at Maggie who sat on a blanket with her head against Glenn's shoulder. "Penelope, Arty, Tony, and all the others deserve a better funeral than we can give them tonight. We'll take care of the dead when the living are safe."

"By now you've all heard that the people who attacked us this morning are the same ones who enslaved my friends and me. I've said it before, but I'll say it again: Thank you. You accepted all of us into your family. More than that, you've appointed some of us as your leaders, your security guards, and your teachers. We are proud to share this home with you."

Some in the crowd clapped. The sound was brief and halfhearted. The kind of claps crowds make when they're waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Rick put his fist against his lips and cleared his throat. "The rumors you've heard are true. These people—the Pierce's—they dammed up the river, surrounded our home with landmines, and they claim that they'll be back to kill us all in less than three days." Murmurs rippled through the crowd. Restless and officially frightened, people shifted their weight, bit down on their nails, and clutched each other's arms. Rick made eye contact with Rosita and Tara who sat at a picnic table with some of their new friends. Pride, an almost fatherly pride tightened Rick's chest when he saw how brave and composed the two women looked compared to the bulging eyes and terrified expressions around them.

"Don't be afraid!" Simultaneously, Rick cocked his chin up high and confident and shoved his fists into his pockets to hide his trembling hands. "There are hundreds of us and, from what we can tell, only about 20 of them. We have the numbers. We have the towers—the high ground. We have weapons and, more importantly, we have people who are willing and able to defend this place. I know that after everything that happened with the infected dogs and the Walker heads, you're frightened. But the Council and I have a plan. Starting first thing tomorrow we're going to—"

"Excuse me, Sheriff, but aren't you forgetting something?" a faceless voice shouted from the crowd. Rick raised his hand to his eyes to block the firelight. He squinted as the crowd parted, Red Sea-style, and a figure emerged. Short, bald, and smirking, The Judge adjusted his black bowtie as he strolled up to Rick. Not for the first time Rick was astounded that the man could stand the Georgia heat (and right then an enormous furnace) while wearing a thick three-piece suit. "I couldn't help but notice, Sir," The Judge said loud enough for everyone to hear, "that you failed to explain what these people want." The Judge spread his arms wide and turned to face the crowd. Briefly he stepped between Rick and the fire and goose bumps immediately sprouted across the sheriff's arms. "Seems to me these people have a right to know why they were attacked. Why they now have to defend their home! Why their children are threatened!"

Someone on a Green Tower balcony clapped twice and called out, "Yeah!"

"I should warn you, Grimes," The Judge said under his breath, "that I know the truth. It wasn't just your little friends who were listening when you spoke with that witch of a woman."

Unfazed, Rick announced, "They want us dead. They—"

" _Liar_!" The Judge bellowed. Rick flinched when he pointed a bony, narrow forefinger up at his nose. "They don't want us dead," The Judge said, pointing at himself and then at the crowd. "They want _you_ dead."

Rick saw Glenn and Maggie get to their feet. He held up two fingers in their direction, telling them to stay where they were. Carol and Michonne fidgeted on the edge of Rick's peripheral vision. He glanced at them, but his eyes fell on Carl who held a sleeping Judith in his arms. The smile that his son offered him wasn't a happy one. He wasn't smiling because he was in a good mood. It was a small, shallow, dimpled smile that told Rick he was trusted.

"They want us dead," Rick repeated. "The 70 of us that escaped the plantation. Dead or enslaved again."

The Judge waved at a woman sitting in a chair behind Rick. She stood up and stepped aside. He snatched the seat up, slammed it into the ground beside Rick and climbed up onto his own dais. "It's his fault." The Judge pointed at Rick. "We'd all be safe if it weren't for him!" Two more people clapped. The murmuring started up again. "There's still one thing you haven't told these fine people, Sheriff. Now I'm going to tell them. I'm going to tell them because I believe that they deserve to hear the truth. They deserve to know all of their options." The Judge paused for effect with the patience and panache of a politician or a stage actor.

Someone on Rick's right asked, "What is it?"

Someone on his left called, "Tell us!"

"We'll do anything!" shouted a female voice.

"Whatever they want they can have it!" yelled another.

The Judge cut them off with a flourish of his arms like a conductor silencing a symphony. "It's very simple," he said in a quieter voice, forcing everyone to lean forward to hear him. "And it's fair. Fair to the majority. Fair to those of us who have been here the longest, those of us who built this place. It's common sense, isn't it? To sacrifice 70 people so that 400 can live in peace?"

Half of the crowd gasped. The murmurs transformed into anxious chatter.

Rick climbed down from his own chair. He carried it over to the woman who gave hers to The Judge and held it steady while she sat down. "We'd be dead by now," he told her. "We'd be dead by now," he said to everyone within arm's reach. Rick returned to the Judge's side and knelt on both knees. "We'd be dead by now!" he called out at the top of his voice. "My friends and I. If we'd stayed at that plantation all of us would be dead by now. And the Pierce's would be on your doorstep looking for more slaves. You'd have the same problem you do now." Rick took a deep breath through his nose and released it, slowly, through his lips. "Here at Eden, we protect our own. It doesn't matter if it's 70 of one group but not another. It doesn't matter if it's five—even one. No one in this community is less important than another! Now, you don't have to fight for us—you can just stay back and watch—but if you're willing, meet at the bridge after breakfast tomorrow. When the Pierce's come for us—for any of us—we'll make sure they won't even make it past the moat!" Rick shoved his fist into the air and several people mimicked the motion.

Wholehearted claps this time. A dozen people stood up and cheered. The rest exchanged looks that Rick couldn't decipher. The crowd broke up slowly. Some stared at Rick or The Judge or both like a fight was about to break out then and there. Rick thought it was Carl's hand that reached down to help him up off of his knees, but it was Antonio. "Your hat's on backwards." Rick gently tapped the top of the boy's Braves cap.

Antonio reached behind his head and flexed the hat's bill. "It's good luck!" he exclaimed. "When it's the bottom of the ninth and you're down a run or two, and you have to rally back, this is how you wear your hat!"

Rick smiled wide enough to show a few teeth. "Better find myself a hat, then." He put his arm around the kid's shoulders as they walked over to join Carl, Judith, Carol, Michonne, Rosita, Tara, Glenn and Maggie. "And I'm glad you're feeling better, son." Antonio grinned skipped a few steps.

Glenn's posture was relaxed, and his face held a lazy smile. Rick knew that it was only for show even before Glenn said, "I've got a bad feeling about this."

"So do I," said Michonne. She adjusted the strap that held her samurai sword to her back.

In a hushed voice Rick said, "Carol, Tara, I need you to go straight to Daryl and move him into my apartment. Now. Go." The two women nodded and half-ran into the tower.

Antonio's face fell. He wrapped his arms tight in a self-hug. "Is, uh, is something wrong, Ricky?"

Rick put one arm around Antonio's shoulders and the other around Carl's. "You know, we've got a lot of work to do tomorrow so I think we should have some fun tonight. How about a slumber party with all our friends, huh? All of us together playing Checkers and drinking the last of that hot chocolate mix?"

Antonio pumped his fist. "Yes! But can we play Chutes and Ladders first?"

"I'll help you set it up!" Rosita said with a fake giddiness that everyone but Antonio sensed. She took his hand and let him lead her inside.

Maggie rubbed her lower stomach. "You're really worried, aren't you, Rick?"

Rick glanced back at The Judge who was helping a group of buzzed men destroy the last of the Walker heads. "That man could've been a senator," he murmured only loud enough for his friends to hear. "Glenn? Michonne? Until this crisis with the Pierce's is over, let's do bed checks in the Blue Tower every night, all right?"

"You mean check to make sure that nobody from the plantation group has been kidnapped and sold into slavery?" Glenn asked, voice dry and under his breath.

"Let's keep an extra eye on each other," Rick agreed. "And on everyone else. I need to know who we can trust…And who we can't."

* * *

Soft knocks on the door at 3am. Rick gently rolled Carl's head off his thigh, stood up from the couch, and carefully stepped over his friends' sleeping bodies. Glenn and Maggie lay curled up together on an air mattress. Carol and Tara lay on Carl's bed beside Judith in her crib. Rosita and Antonio fell asleep with cards still in their hands, worn out from a vicious game of Go Fish. Michonne curled up under the kitchen table like a cat. Rick gripped his gun and unlocked the door. Combat medic Miriam stood in the hall with a thermos that was so wide she had to hold it with both hands. "Sorry I woke you," she whispered, and offered an apologetic smile. "I went to check on my patient, but he was gone. Thought I'd bring him some tea."

Rick nodded. "He's here. Thank you." He accepted the thermos, unscrewed the cap and sniffed. "What is it?"

"Elderberry tea. It'll help with his fever."

Rick smiled. "Flu remedy. An old friend of mine made it once."

"My grandmother taught me." Miriam nodded and tucked her hair behind her ears. "I should probably get to bed."

"Right. Thanks again."

"Sure." Miriam took two steps before pivoting back to the door. "Rick? I just wanted you to know that I'll be at the bridge tomorrow."

A tightness Rick didn't know was in his stomach uncoiled. "Yeah?"

"Yeah. My friends, too. Lots of people, I think. What you said tonight about how we should fight for each other? I believe that, too."

Rick simultaneously felt both relaxed and energized. "Good. Thank you. I think I needed to hear that."

Her smile reminded him of Lori's. "Goodnight."

"Night." Rick locked the door, tiptoed through his friends again, and slipped into the master bedroom. A short, ivory candlestick on the bedside table cast a dim sepia light. The bed was empty except for sheets and three pillows. Rick's heart raced for a second before he spotted Daryl on the floor by the bathroom. Relieved, his heart slowed, then immediately sped up again. "Hey, whoa, hey, you all right?" Rick slid to his knees beside Daryl and gripped his friend's shoulder. "Why are you out of bed?"

Daryl's voice was even gravellier than normal from lack of use. "Took a piss," he explained. "I'm going back to bed. Just, uh, needed to rest."

Rick pressed the back of his hand against Daryl's cheek and his forehead. "In other words, you fell on your ass." Daryl swatted Rick's hand away with the strength of a newborn kitten. Rick set the thermos down, got to his feet and held his hand out. When Daryl tried to stand up on his own, the sheriff sighed, "Just let me help, will you?"

"I can do it myself," Daryl growled. "Ain't no baby."

"I'm sure you can, but you don't have to." Without waiting for permission, Rick wrapped his arms around Daryl's torso and lifted him to his feet. The archer started to protest but then his face turned white and he grabbed Rick's shoulder to steady himself. He didn't complain when Rick guided him back to bed, helped him lay down half propped up by pillows, and tucked the sheets up to his chest. "Before you pass out I need you to drink something."

Daryl frowned when Rick held the thermos to his lips. "Smells like beets and cranberries."

"It's just tea. Try and stomach a little." Daryl scowled but tipped his chin up and let Rick pour a few mouthfuls down his throat. Rick set the thermos beside the candle. The rocking chair was within arm's reach, and he pulled it up to the bed, sat, and put his boots up on the mattress next to Daryl's knees.

Daryl watched through half-lidded eyes as his friend settled in. "Here," he grunted, and tossed one of his pillows into Rick's lap. "You need sleep more than I do. You have a lot of hatches to batten down tomorrow." Rick didn't argue, but instead of putting the pillow behind his head he hugged it against his chest. "Carol told me the town meeting didn't go so well."

Rick pursed his lips together and avoided Daryl's gaze. Nearly a minute passed before he spoke. "History repeats itself."

Daryl yawned and rubbed his eyes. "What are you talking about?"

"We find a place. We feel safe—at least a little safe, for at least a little while. And then Walkers come. Or people. Or both. We fight, and some of us die, and then we go on to the next place."

"You sound like the Patriarch when he was talking about that Sissy-puss story."

"I think he was right about us. About me. I am Sisyphus." Rick gestured at himself from head to toe. "I make the same mistakes over and over again. Every day I push a boulder up a hill. Every day it rolls back down. I know it's going to roll back down but dumbass that I am, I push it again."

"Wait, what? The moral to that story is that it's dumb to push the boulder?"

"There isn't a moral. It's his punishment in Hell. He almost succeeds and then—whoosh—" Rick used his hand to mime a man slipping like a cartoon character on a banana peel.

Daryl frowned. He folded his arms against his chest and said, "That's bullshit."

Rick shrugged. "Tell that to the Ancient Greeks." He shut his eyes, tired.

"Nah, I mean you're bullshit."

Eyes flashed open. "What?"

"You think Sissy-puss is a dumbass but you're wrong, man. I mean you're right that you're him and he's you but he ain't no dumbass."

Rick thought about force-feeding Daryl some more tea. "I'm not following."

Daryl sat up a few inches. "Somebody somewhere sometime decided that story was about punishment but maybe it's, you know, an example. One of those stories you tell kids 'cuz you want them to do something. The moral of the Sissy-puss story is that you keep pushing the boulder. No matter how many times it rolls back down, you keep pushing."

"You keep pushing," Rick repeated.

"That's what you do, Rick. That's what you've always done. After Atlanta, after the farm, the prison, Terminus, Grady… most people would've shit their pants, sucked their thumbs and cried for their mamas, but you kept pushing. You kept pushing _us_."

"When you're going through hell, keep going," Rick whispered.

Daryl cocked his head to the side. "Who said that? That blue fish in that movie about the missing orange fish?"

"Churchill."

"Who?"

Rick smiled the first genuine smile he'd mustered in days. "Keep pushing the boulder. That's our motto, then: keep pushing."

Daryl snorted. "Order us some matching t-shirts."

"Baseball jerseys would be pretty cool."

Daryl yawned again. He closed his eyes and settled deeper into his pillows. "The Eden Boulders. Sure sounds like a slow-pitch softball team full of white people."

"We could organize a regional tournament," Rick laughed. "It's an automatic home run if you hit the ball right through a Walker's skull."

"Mmm," Daryl hummed. Exhaustion crept up on him. Rick listened carefully as Daryl's breaths evened out in sleep. He fell asleep a few minutes later, pillow in his lap, heels grazing his friend's kneecaps.

Rick didn't know what woke him up. He was fast asleep, deep asleep, and dreaming about Lori. And then he was on his feet with his gun pointed at the bedroom door and his heart pounding so hard that his skull vibrated.

Daryl was still zipping up his fly when he came out of the bathroom. "Did you hear that?" he demanded.

"Something woke me." Rick didn't lower his gun.

"Sounded like an explosion outside." Daryl padded over to the window and peeked through the blinds. " _Shit_."

Rick joined him. It took his sleepy brain an extra second to comprehend the scene. East of the compound, no more than twenty yards past the moat, three treetops lit up like birthday candles. "Landmine?"

"More than one." Daryl started putting on his shoes and socks.

"A Walker could've tripped it. An animal."

"I heard screams." Daryl failed to hide a wince as he pulled on a black t-shirt. "Flashlight's in the dresser."

Rick opened the top dresser drawer and found two flashlights, a loaded revolver, and a pair of binoculars. He nearly jumped out of his skin for the second time in as many minutes when Daryl yelped. Rick turned to see him strapping his crossbow around his torso. "The hell do you think you're doing?"

"I'm feeling better."

Rick had to admit that he looked better. "Daryl, I probably cracked one of your ribs when I did CPR."

"Oh, definitely." Daryl led the way into the living room. "Come on."

Everyone was still asleep except for Carol. She stood at the apartment door with her right eye pressed against the peephole. "Glenn and Maggie left to do a security check twenty minutes ago," she whispered worriedly to the two men.

Rick's mouth went dry. "We'll find them," he assured her. "Stay—"

"I know." Carol patted the knife in her jeans pocket. "Go." She opened the door and locked it behind them.

Another surprise waited for them on the floor and walls of the hallway. Chemicals from the still-wet neon red spray-paint burned Rick's eyes. The paint was old, spoiled. Someone had left them a message over and over on every flat surface in sight:

 **LEAVE OR DIE**

The words seemed to hypnotize Rick. Daryl's hand on his shoulder was the only thing that woke him up. "Come on," the archer said. "Rick. Come on."

Sleepy-eyed silhouettes stumbled out of the other two towers and stood whispering in small groups in the courtyard. Although the fire in the swimming pool had been put out, a hazy fog of smoke hovered around it, somehow making the black night even darker. They needed the flashlights to see until they turned the corner around the building where the fires in the trees lit the area up like sunshine. A female figure was on her knees in the ten-yard space between the moat and one of the vegetable gardens. Fire cast her shadow long and thin.

"Maggie?" Rick reached her first, but Daryl was only a few steps behind. " _Maggie_!"

Tears revealed a shallow layer of dirt on Maggie's cheeks. "We tried to stop them!" she blubbered, hands tugging on Rick's shirt and eyes unblinking.

"Stop who? What happened?"

"A group. Maybe twenty people. They wanted to leave. Said they weren't going to just wait to be slaughtered."

"Oh, no," Daryl breathed. He raised the binoculars and scanned the woods.

"We told them over and over about the landmines, but they thought it was a trick, just an empty threat—Rick, there were _kids_ —"

Rick cupped her chin in his hands. "Maggie, where's Glenn?"

Maggie rubbed her lower abdomen. "When we heard the explosion he…" A trembling finger pointed at the trees. Maggie's lips quivered. "He told me to wait here, said he had to check for survivors. _Rick_ — _no_!"

One flying leap and Rick landed ankle-deep in mud at the bottom of the moat. He scrambled up the opposite bank, fingers grasping tree roots and fistfuls of dirt as he climbed. Lousy tracker that he was, he had at least learned enough from Daryl to be able to follow twenty pairs of feet. He shone his flashlight ahead, eyes darting back and forth between the horizon and the ground. "Glenn!" he hollered. " _Glenn_!"

Somewhere in the forest ahead, another mine went off.

The combination of smoke and dismembered limbs made Glenn's eyes water. He stumbled from body to body, coughing against his fist, checking for pulses. A dozen yards to his right one of the lit red cedar trees toppled forward. It exploded when it landed directly on a landmine. Branches scraped up Glenn's face as his body was launched backwards. He landed hard on his ass and his head would've slammed against a boulder the size of a toolshed if there hadn't already been a soft body there. Glenn recognized the tall redheaded man with the mismatched sneakers. " _Jake_!" he coughed.

"Glenn?" Jake stared Glenn without really seeing him. Although he seemed to be in one piece, his eyes wouldn't focus, and when Glenn helped him stand up he bent at the waist like he was about to puke. "What the hell happened?" Jake asked when the dry heaves stopped.

Anger briefly overwhelmed Glenn's fear. "Exactly what I told you would happen, dumbass! You guys tripped a landmine!"

Jake frowned and rubbed his right ear. "What?"

Glenn's ears were ringing, too. He shook his head, then yanked Jake's arm across his shoulders and started marching back the way he came. A third mine erupted, but this one was further away. The fire continued to knock over trees as it spread. "Did anyone else survive?" he shouted into Jake's left ear.

It took Jake a long time to digest the question. "Don't think so," he eventually said. He noticed a splatter of blood on his long baggy shorts and stopped to wipe it away.

"Keep going!" Glenn bellowed.

"Hey, is that Rosita friend of yours available?" Jake asked, every word a slow slur.

It didn't occur to Glenn to be on the lookout for Walkers. He didn't even have his gun out when one stumbled out from behind a tree. Its' shoes were on fire but it limped towards them, snarling, teeth snapping, hands reaching. The first bullet nicked the thing's ear. The second smashed straight through its left eye. Bewildered, Glenn looked around for the source and discovered a red-faced Rick Grimes sprinting towards him. Without a word, the sheriff took half of Jake's weight and doubled their speed.

Daryl was waiting for them on that side of the moat. He raised his crossbow and an arrow sailed past Rick's shoulder to skewer some unseen threat. Glenn let Daryl help with Jake so that he could scurry to the other side to Maggie. A crowd had gathered in their brief absence. Miriam arrived at the head of a pack of medics toting medical supplies and blankets. The crossbow-wielding Eleanora with her bright red bra and see-through tank top fired her own weapon when another Walker emerged from the trees. Hugh the accountant stood beside her with his rifle.

Rick left Jake in Miriam's hands and Glenn in Maggie's. As he and Daryl marched through the crowd back towards the towers he tried to remember how many fire extinguishers were on each floor of the apartment complexes. Although he heard himself giving orders to faceless security guards about getting every fire suppression resource they had to the tower roofs just in case the fire jumped the moat, the majority of his attention was on the familiar chemical smell of spray-paint wafting from some nameless person in the crowd.

The tree closest to the moat was a 100-foot hemlock. When landmines started going off like popcorn popping, families of squirrels abandoned their dens and drays, and rock doves and screen-owls their nests. They didn't understand why the earth was quaking, why stones were flying, or why leaves and twigs were catching fire. The creatures ran and flew for their lives through a rain of rock and dirt. Ran and flew just in time because a human skull landed on a mine near the tree's roots and the trunk teetered.

Rick was halfway back to the Green Tower when cones and needles showered down on his neck. Before his brain comprehended what that meant, Daryl tackled him to the ground so hard that both rolled several yards. They stopped in time to see the hemlock tree smash into the side of the building, piercing several windows on the fifth floor. Shards of glass, bits of brick and flaming branches detonated over the crowd. Sparks landed in the garden and immediately the dry leaves caught fire. People screamed and ran in every direction. At least two bodies were caught under the massive trunk when the back half of it slammed into the ground.

" _Daryl_!" The stampede separated Rick from his friend but by the time he got to his feet Glenn was there with both Maggie and Daryl in tow. Miriam, Eleanora, and Hugh were right behind them. What light the burning tree cast into the night sky was quickly blocked by black smoke.

"Rick, what do we do?" Maggie all but screamed.

Rick blinked at her. A strange calm settled on his shoulders. Mania was directly behind it, but still held at bay. Rick wiped glowing ashes off his pants, took a deep, long breath, and started spitting orders. He pointed at Maggie. "Get Judith and Carl. Go to the pump house and stay there." She took off without arguing. Rick pointed at Glenn. "Evacuate the first four floors of the Green Tower and send them to Blue." To Hugh he said, "Wake up the Blue Tower. Make room for the Green residents. Bring every fire extinguisher and every drop of water to the courtyard." Hugh and Glenn left. Rick's attention switched to Eleanora, Miriam, and Daryl. "Wake up the Red Tower. Same thing—water and fire extinguishers. Miriam, check the kitchen for salt and baking soda—for anything that can suppress fire."

The women ran off, but Daryl hesitated. "What are _you_ doing?" he asked Rick. Smoke entered Daryl's throat and he coughed it out. "Rick?"

Rick looked up at the burning tree. "I'll evacuate the top half of the tower."

"I'll go with you." Daryl started to run before Rick could argue.

The Green Tower shook like a missile hit it. Michonne rolled out from under the kitchen table and unsheathed her sword. She nearly beheaded Rosita who was sprinting for the door. "What's going on?" Tara yelled. Michonne couldn't see her. The whole apartment was starting to fill up with smoke.

Maggie burst in just as Rosita and Carol left. "Everybody out!" she hollered as she sprinted into the bedroom and picked up Judith. "Carl, Antonio, stay with me!"

Michonne didn't try to stop the two boys when they ignored Maggie and ran out into the hall. She was right behind them. A fire extinguisher hung near the double front doors and she ripped it off the wall. She stepped aside as Glenn barreled in, then held the door open so that Maggie could get out safely with the baby. Tara came a moment later carrying six bottles of water snatched from Rick's kitchen. As Michonne and Tara circled around the building they passed Daryl and Rick.

"Oh, god!" Tara gasped when they reached the east side of the building. The tree looked like one long candlewick. Half of the windows on the fifth floor were belching black smoke. In the distance, another landmine went off. An acre of forest was eating itself up but, luckily, nothing bigger than ashes and sparks were jumping the moat.

Michonne and Tara looked at the blaze, at the meager tools in their hands, at each other, and then back at the fire. "We don't stand a chance," Tara gasped. "We don't have enough water."

"No, we don't," Michonne said. She looked at the dry moat, and then at the horizon. "But we know where to find some…"

The chickens in the pump house screeched with shock when Carol opened the door. Sassafras, the biggest, fattest pig they had (Carl named her) was snoozing under a three-legged table. It took several pokes from Carol's boot to get the beast on its feet. A telescopic pool rake hung by its mesh net from a nail near the ceiling. Carol untangled it and stretched the pole out as wide as it could go, which turned out to be a good ten feet. After ripping a hole in the net, she put the aluminum head around Sassafras' neck and then tied the mesh in knots to make a sort of collar. It was the closest thing she could get to a leash.

The door opened again and Michonne walked in. Both women froze and stared at one another. "What are you doing?" Michonne asked when she saw the pig.

Carol cocked her chin up. "What are _you_ doing?"

Michonne shifted her weight back and forth between her feet. For nearly a minute she just gazed back at Carol. When she finally spoke, it was with a meek, mousy voice. "I was going to herd her with my sword."

Carol shrugged. "That would work. I just didn't want her to get too far ahead of me." Carol patted Sassafras' snout. "Thought it might be smart to go in a straight line. Step where she steps."

Michonne nodded. "If we run we could make it to the dam in half an hour."

"Assuming they didn't put landmines in the river and we get out legs blown off."

Michonne studied the older woman's face. "We don't both have to go. No offense, Carol, but I might be a bit faster."

Carol gave her a humoring smile. Then she used the pole to guide Sassafras out the door.

Maggie didn't know what to think when she saw Michonne jump into the dry river and Carol shove a pig down after her. She held the wide-eyed Judith tight against her chest and sprinted the last twenty yards to the pump house. Carol was just about to jump down into the moat when Maggie reached her. "Where—what—where are you guys going?" she demanded. "What the hell are you doing?"

Carol took Maggie by the elbows and squeezed her. "We'll be right back," she said, as if they were just taking Sassafras for a walk around the block. "Don't worry."

Maggie looked at Michonne for an answer, but the other woman dropped her gaze. "It's just one side of the building," Maggie reasoned. "It might take a while, but they'll put it out. You know they will."

"And they'll use up all of the drinking water doing it." Carol suddenly leaned in and kissed Maggie on the cheek. Then she grinned at Judith and placed a kiss on her forehead. "Goodbye, Lil' Asskicker." With a last wink at Maggie, Carol dropped down beside Michonne.

Maggie was at a loss for words as the two women began to run. She cried out just before they were out of earshot: "It's suicide!"

 _Rosita_

The "Ford" keychain hanging from Rosita's belt smacked against her left thigh as she sprinted across the bridge. _This is what Abraham would do_ , she told herself. _This is what that stupid, dumbass knucklehead would do_ … Rosita climbed into the yellow bulldozer and found the keys in the ignition. Turning it on was the easy part. Each of the dozen levers had small pictures on them but they were less than helpful. Every image looked like some robotic alien.

" _Shit_."

Rosita whipped her long brown hair out of its ponytail and redid it tighter and higher on her head. She shrugged off her long-sleeved, button-down plaid shirt and tossed it out the window. After tightening her green tank top and cracking all ten of her knuckles, Rosita took a deep breath and started experimenting. The first lever she pulled dropped the front blade from its upright position down into the dirt.

 _Carol and Michonne_

They were halfway to the dam when Sassafras' body was violently divided into several pieces. The blast wave from the landmine knocked Carol back into Michonne, and Michonne into the ground. Both women lay still for several minutes trying to catch their breaths and waiting for the ringing in their ears to subside. Michonne would've heard the small pack of Walkers stumble towards the sound and into the riverbed if her ears weren't vibrating like church bells. But she didn't hear them coming, and didn't realize anything was wrong until Carol suddenly catapulted her body over Michonne's and tackled an approaching shadow. Michonne stuck her sword in the dirt and used it to pull herself to her feet. She shouted at Carol to step aside, but the older woman was busy slamming her knife between a Walker's eyes. Michonne stepped around them, pivoted, and drove her weapon through one Walker's head and then another, turning the skulls into shish kabab. Two more rained down, then, falling into the riverbed with even less grace than usual Walkers. When Michonne's hearing came back, the sound of the Walkers' grunts nearly deafened her again. The desperate, feral creatures moved too fast for Michonne to get her sword up in time. She wrestled them to the ground and held them still while Carol finished them off.

When it was over, they exchanged determined looks and moved forward side-by-side without a word.

 _Carl and Antonio_

Carl and Antonio jogged up to the tenth floor without stopping. They ran down the hall shouting and slamming their fists against the doors. One boy took the left side of the hall and the other the right. When they found a fire extinguisher they shouldered it and kept going—going through the ninth floor, the eighth, the seventh and the sixth. Dozens of men, women and children evacuated their apartments and stampeded down the stairs, hesitating only when they reached the black smoke filling the fifth floor. In the back of the pack, Carl shot white suds from an extinguisher into the crowd. " _Keep moving_!" he hollered. Fathers picked up their children and mothers blocked their noses and they ran through the smoke and kept on going down, straight down and out the door.

The boys set all the fire extinguishers against the double-doors of the fifth-floor elevator. At first Carl thought that Antonio was coughing because of the smoke. But then the boy suddenly braced both hands against the elevator and shuddered. The coughs transformed into wheezes, and then gasps. Carl had to lean in close to hear what Antonio was trying to say. "As... As…" he panted. " _Asthma_!"

Carl cursed. "Do you have an inhaler?" he asked, although he already knew the answer. Antonio shook his head and Carl cursed again. He gestured towards his spine. "Get on—come on—piggyback ride." Antonio obeyed, jumping onto Carl's back and wrapping his arms around the older boy's neck. Carl staggered briefly under the awkward weight but managed to get his footing, secure Antonio's legs by putting his arms under his knees, and then race down the stairs after the crowd. Glenn, who was evacuating the fourth floor, couldn't see them in all the smoke. Neither could Rick and Daryl who passed them on the stairs.

And Carl didn't see the figures going the wrong way on the staircase.

Two shadows with crowbars followed Rick and Daryl to the fifth floor.

 _Marcy_

In the brief span of time after 8-year-old Marcy woke up but before she opened her eyes, the child was so very, very grateful that her sleep was interrupted. She was dreaming about the wagons at the Pierce Plantation, about the time before she reunited with her mom, dad and older brother in that barn. Before they escaped through the Underground Railroad and came to their new home.

Marcy woke up because a hemlock tree crashed into her apartment and set the building on fire.

It was just a sound to her at first. Just a sound until she opened her bedroom door and saw that the living room, kitchen and the other two bedrooms were on fire. She rubbed her brown eyes with white fists, opened her mouth to scream for her family but instantly swallowed black smoke. Choking, she knelt in the doorframe and coughed against the tan carpet. For a second she thought she heard a roar—her brother?—but then there was just the crackling of burning furniture and the tinkling of shards of glass falling from the broken windows. She saw the outline of the front door on the other side of the room. There was no getting to it, not with a wall of fire in the way. Marcy retreated into her room, grabbed a pillow, and hid under her bed.

"Fireman," the little girl prayed. "Fireman, come get me!"

It was a cowboy who appeared at her door. Had to be a cowboy. He wore a red bandana around his face. The nice man made a hole in the fire. He picked her up and carried her out into the hall. She smiled when he handed her over to her science teacher, Mr. Rhee. As Glenn carried her downstairs she waved at two more men wearing bandannas. They emerged from the shadows beside the elevator and went into the apartment. Neither of them waved back.

* * *

Hugh West the accountant took the stairs three at a time up to the Blue Tower fifth floor. His twin brother Bill, who also had a linebacker's body, stood watching the Green Tower burn from their apartment balcony. The Judge stood beside him, sipping cold coffee from a cracked cup. Hugh grabbed the wrought iron railing and shook it, disturbing the two men from their silent vigil. "Now's our chance," Hugh gasped. "All the smoke, all the commotion… Now's our chance."

The Judge sighed as if the sight of a burning building full of screaming children was boring. "Their friends are all around. You won't get past them unseen."

"We will if they're distracted." Bill, a former nightclub bouncer, took a lighter out of his pocket and flicked it on. "We just have to make the fire bigger."

Hugh scratched his scalp through his shaved hair. "That fire's hard enough to control as it is. You want to burn the whole tower down?"

Bill shrugged. "We got two more."

The Judge finished his coffee. He sat the cup and saucer down on top of a dead houseplant and cracked his knuckles against his own ribs. "My men in the Red Tower can hit the opposite side with Molotov Cocktails. You can escape while the crowd is pulled in two directions."

"And if we don't then we'll burn up, too," Hugh pointed out. He buttoned, unbuttoned and re-buttoned his shirt collar, a nervous habit leftover from his days as a stock broker.

"If we don't try this plan then we might all be dead the day after tomorrow," the Judge reminded the two brothers. "Needs of the many, gentlemen. The Pierce's, those hillbilly freaks might leave the rest of us alone if they get Grimes and Dixon."

Bill walked into his bedroom and returned with a pair of black handkerchiefs. As he wrapped one around his face he said, "You're a man of your word, right, Judge? When this is all over, when you're back in the penthouse with your harem, ruling over this here kingdom like…uh, like a king…The two of us are going to be by your side, right? Sitting on your right, sitting on your left, enjoying the food and the women…That's what you promised."

"That's what I promised," the Judge assured him. "Wine and power and women, gentlemen. Just turn Grimes and Dixon over to the Pierce's, and you'll have everything you want."

* * *

Daryl crawled on his stomach, Army style, back into the hallway. Rick was waiting for him, coughing against the carpet where the only fresh air remained. "Did you find anymore survivors?" Daryl yelled over the roar of the flames.

"There's one more apartment to check," Rick replied, pointing at the last door in the hall. He shook his red fire extinguisher, frowned, then tossed the canister aside. "I'm out of ammo."

"Not that it's making a dent, but I got a little." Daryl tucked his fire extinguisher against his chest like a football and led the way. His fingers were on the knob when the door suddenly burst open from the inside.

Daryl barely raised the extinguisher in time to block the descending crowbar. The weight of it fell all at once on his bruised ribs and he couldn't stop himself from inhaling smoke when he gasped from the pain. A man with a black handkerchief covering his mouth tossed his crowbar aside and grabbed Daryl by the throat. A second attacker tackled Rick and slammed the back of his head against the floor. Daryl wasn't sure if his friend was unconscious or just dazed, but he didn't make a move to block his face from the punches.

* * *

Rosita beeped the bulldozer's horn as soon as the fallen hemlock tree was in sight. Tara was on the ground with a dozen helpers carrying buckets of water to put out the fires they could reach, and she had the frame of mind to shepherd everyone out of the way. Rosita increased the bulldozer's speed up to 15 mph and slammed it into the tree. Sparks rained down onto the windshield and the gunshot-like cracks of splintering wood made Rosita's ears ring. The tree took out a few more windows as it slid across the fifth floor before toppling down onto the ground. The bulk of it rolled right into the dry riverbed with an enormous crash. When Rosita looked back over her shoulder she saw a hundred grinning Edenites clapping their hands.

* * *

Daryl's ears popped. The air pressure in the hallway suddenly shifted and shards of glass blasted through the apartment at bullet-speed. Daryl's attacker—Bill, he realized—looked back at the sound and took a punch of glass in the face. He screamed and covered his eyes. Daryl head-butted him and Bill stumbled backwards into the firey apartment.

His crossbow was within arm's reach, but the fire extinguisher was already in his hands so that's what Daryl used to smack Hugh West so hard in the head that he rolled across the floor and crashed into the elevator doors. " _Rick_!" Daryl didn't even try to be gentle when he smacked his friend's face. "Rick, wake up, dammit!"

Bill reemerged. He fell to his knees beside Daryl and squawked, "I can't see!" His hands clawed at the glass in his face but the only thing that accomplished was shredding the skin on his fingertips. His right pant leg was on fire. Daryl used the last of the chemicals in his fire extinguisher to put it out before he slammed Bill into the floor beside Rick and sat on his chest.

"What the hell are you doing, man?" Daryl bellowed. "You crazy sons of bitches—why you trying to kill us?"

"My brother!" Bill wailed. "Where's my brother?"

"He's right over—" It wasn't the smoke that smothered Daryl's sentence. It was the sight of a Walker on fire from head to toe stumbling down the hall and landing on Hugh West's body teeth-first. There were three more behind it. One of the women struggled to hop on only one leg. The other had been burned off. " _Shit_!" Daryl sputtered. He smacked Bill across the face with the back of his hand and demanded, "Why are you trying to kill us?"

"We ain't, we ain't!" Bill shouted. "He sent us. The Judge man. We have to take you to that crazy Pierce lady. It's the only way—the only way they'll leave us alone!"

Daryl cursed again as the three fire walkers got closer and closer to Rick. "You stupid son of a bitch," he spat again. "Should've told the Judge to do his own dirty work!" Daryl took a deep breath of relatively fresh air and stood, dragging Bill to his feet with him. "You'll be seeing the Judge in Hell real soon!" Daryl declared. He shoved Bill with all his might, sending the man stumbling towards the fire walkers. He hit them like a bowling ball knocking down pins. They fell but the hungry mouths immediately pounced again, and the hallway was filled with screams.

Daryl scooted over to Rick and shook him again. "Come on, brother, we gotta move!" To the archer's relief, the sheriff's eyes opened.

Rick's eyes were red and watery, and his voice came from a raw throat. "What's going on…?" Rick slurred. He looked around and saw the dead end of the hallway on his right, a line of fire walkers on his left and the black smoke billowing out of the apartment door in front of him. "Oh," he groaned.

"Can ya stand?" Daryl coughed.

"And go where?" Rick asked groggily. He groaned as Daryl dragged him to his knees and held him there, steady. "We dying by fire or by fire _and_ Walkers?"

"We'll see." Daryl grunted with effort as he lifted Rick up onto his feet and pulled the other man's arm across his shoulders. "Just move your legs, Rick."

Daryl shut the apartment door behind them and locked the deadbolt for good measure. The dining area was the first room. A lazy draft emptied some of the black smoke through the shattered glass doors that led to the balcony. Getting to it by going left around the dining room table meant walking right through fire. Going to the right was exactly the same, so Daryl and Rick had to crawl under the burning dining room table to cross the room.

Even the wrought iron rungs of the balcony felt hot to the touch. They looked over it at the ground four stories below, back at the burning apartment behind them, and at the fire sprouting from every window in sight.

"Damn." Daryl shook his head. "Well, Rick, we dying by fire or by falling?"

* * *

The Matriarch of the Pierce clan was on her way to deliver a bowl of oatmeal to Cain, Dustin, Kevin and the other sentries when the ground shuddered. Her nieces, nephews and cousins who weren't on guard duty all stumbled out of their tents, pointing shotguns and crossbows in every direction and shouting senseless questions. Eloise Pierce calmly set the bowls down, wiped her hands on her apron, and climbed the uneven brick steps that led to the top of the dam. She raised a lantern high so that she could see in every direction. See the dry riverbed in front of her, the Chomper pens to the left, the tents to the right and the water behind her lapping against the dam like ocean waves against dunes.

"Must've been an earthquake!" someone shouted. Not a second later another tremor hit. Ma felt it coming from the south.

"Damn fools!" Her blond son, Dustin, joined her on the dam. Like he did whenever he felt anxious, Dustin rubbed the scar on his chin with the brim of his green John Deere hat. "Somebody out there set off the mines!"

Ma grinned. "Listen to that ruckus. Chompers might do our work for us. All that noise will draw 'em from miles." She glanced down at the Walkers they had caged up and chained. "Getting our boys all riled up, too."

Dustin folded his arms against his bony chest. "There's another one! Damn, look at them trees in the distance! Shit's burning up!"

Ma's smile deflated. She sniffed and felt the direction of the wind. "We ain't had a good rain in months. If Mr. Stupid and his buddies don't put that fire out it could come our way."

Dustin stood on the tips of his boots and stretched straight and high. "Shit, Ma. Maybe we should pack up camp."

* * *

Wind pushed the fire north. The absence of rain plus the high Georgia temperatures had dried the forest out. The flames moved through the woods so fast that they surpassed Michonne and Carol and reached the Pierce's encampment before they did. When the two women heard the frantic voices, they climbed up the riverbed and peeked their noses out. In the firelight night was day, and they had a clear view of the camp.

"Oh my God," Carol whispered. "They've been recruiting. They've been recruiting like crazy—there must be over a hundred people here!"

"Is that _dynamite_?" Michonne asked.

The stack of dynamite looked, at first glance, like a bunch of used paper towel rolls. But a white wick hung from the end of each roll and each was clearly stamped with _Property of U.S. Army_.

"I don't remember seeing that in the storage shed Carl found," Carol said. "Flame throwers—sure—but not _dynamite_."

"They must have returned to the army base and stocked up." Michonne pointed at a short, stubby plastic barrel sitting behind the explosives. "They got more grenades, too. And I can see at least a dozen sniper rifles leaning against that one tent." Carol dislodged her footholds and slid back to the bottom of the creek. Michonne didn't miss the grunt of pain that came out of the older woman when she landed. "Carol?" She slid, too. "Hey. You're limping. What's wrong?"

Carol rubbed her right hip. "Those Walkers we ran into back there. The one wearing the top hat." Carol snorted. It sounded too wet, too uncontrolled. "I finally got bit, and it was by some douchebag in a top hat."

Michonne covered both of her eyes. "Oh, Carol."

"There's a canoe by the boathouse. Enjoy the ride back."

"I'm not going to let you commit suicide," Michonne hissed.

A strange calm settled over Carol. "What you're going to do, Michonne, is tell Daryl and Rick and the others that…That I'll miss them."

"What's your plan, huh? Are you going to take a grenade to the dam and just blow yourself up?"

"Don't be stupid." Carol reached out and rubbed Michonne's upper arms. "I'm going to lure as many of them as close as I can to the dam, and _then_ blow myself up." Carol winced. Her hand was red when it came away from the bite in her leg. "Michonne, I can feel the fever already. If I do this, then I go out helping my friends. Is there any better way to die?"

Michonne swallowed. "I'm staying with you."

"No, you're not."

"I am."

"No!" Both women winced. If they got any louder, the Pierce's would hear them. "You have to help our friends, too. And the best way you can help them is by riding that canoe home and warning them that the Pierce's have _dynamite and an army_!"

"What can I do to help you?" Michonne asked sadly. "Please, Carol. Let me do something—just one thing for you. Let me thank you."

Carol put her forefinger against her lips in thought. "I was thinking about stealing that queen bitch's horse. Want to saddle it for me?"

* * *

The sound of Serpent's dead family haunted his dreams. Cain heard his wife but didn't see her. Heard Molly calling their daughter into the house for dinner. Heard her laughing at some dumb joke he'd told a thousand times. Heard her talking about how they could grow old together in Woodbury… Cain heard his daughter humming a tune from Sunday School. Samantha always hummed a song no matter what she was doing. Cleaning dishes, playing "house" with her stuffed animals… The only time she went quiet was around Merle Dixon. She said he smiled funny.

Cain heard the sound of his son Eric's rusty green wheelchair straining across carpet. Heard him shriek when Carol knocked him off the balcony. Heard every bone in his body shatter when it hit the ground. Cain itched to return to Eden Towers. Itched to hear Carol scream when he threw her off a roof… Sometimes imagining what her bones would sound like was the only thing that calmed him down. Even now as he marched around the Chomper pens for the fifth time that night, not even the sound of the dead's desperate moans and the sight of their skinless fingers reaching for him through the chicken wire phased him. Soon he and the Pierce's would get them. Get Grimes, Dixon, and the bitch who killed his son. Soon he would make her scream—

" _ **Hey, assholes**_!"

Cain pivoted towards the river and froze, shocked. "Speak of the devil," he said to himself. There she was. Carol. There was Carol on Ma's horse standing pretty on top of the dam. " _Holy shit_."

Cain broke into a sprint and met Kevin and Dustin at the edge of the dam, only a few strides from the steps. "What the hell are you doing, lady?" Dustin demanded. "Get your ass off that horse!"

Carol patted the horse's neck and seemed to whisper something into its ear. Cain felt dozens of his fellow soldiers run up behind him. He heard them cock their guns, heard them mutter. He cleared his voice loudly and addressed the crowd without turning away from Carol. "Some of you have asked questions about the people who threaten us," he called out. "If you have any doubt that they should be destroyed, know this: This woman is one of them. This is the woman who murdered my son."

Carol made a show of cupping her hands around her ears. "Sorry? Do I know you?"

Cain's blood boiled. He leapt onto the dam and marched up to the horse's nose. "My son! My son, Eric! You killed him. She killed him!" he screamed, pointing at her with both hands.

"You mean that brat who forced my friends to have sex with him? The same Eric who was firing a gun into a crowd of innocent children? _That_ Eric?" Carol paused for dramatic effect. In the back of his mind, Cain wondered why she looked so relaxed, so confident, so…what _was_ she doing? Those thoughts remained in the back of his mind when Carol suddenly pulled a string of grenades out of her coat. She held the string up for all to see. "Let's both go see your son," she said. And then she shook the string.

Everyone else reacted. Cain heard boots running. Heard people screaming. But he didn't move. He just watched as this crazy woman on a horse with fire raging in the forest behind her unpinned a dozen grenades all at once. Her triumphant, grinning face was the last thing he ever saw.

* * *

Rick and Daryl heard the water before they saw it. Everyone did. It was louder than the roar of the flames and brassier than the rumble of the bulldozer. Whoever unleashed the Eden River hadn't done so one brick at a time. The cork had popped. The back-country creek version of a tidal wave rushed onto the scene, instantly smothering the burning hemlock tree in the riverbed. So much of it flowed so fast that it jumped its boundaries and spilled inches-deep across the grass. Fire eating up the gardens disappeared instantly. Edenites fighting the flames filled their buckets without trying. The pool was for swimming again.

Standing on the balcony with fire blocking them on three sides, Rick and Daryl watched the rushing water for a whole minute before they turned to each other.

Daryl cleared his raw throat. "Jump?"

"Leap. We have to leap forward, not just fall down."

"Can we survive? Don't bones break even in water if you fall from too high?"

Rick ignored the question. "We go in feet first. Keep your toes straight and your arms up." The sheriff used his hand to mime diving. "The current's going to take us fast. Don't fight it. Focus on getting to the surface first. Take a deep breath and…" Rick winced and rubbed the back of his head. His hand came away bloody. "When did I hit my head?"

"Five minutes ago, man." Daryl rolled his eyes. "You got a concussion. Bet you're not supposed to go swimming right after you get a concussion."

"It's right after you eat." Rick massaged his temples and sighed. "Don't think we should wait here an hour."

"Yeah." Daryl glanced at the fire. "Now or never, brother." Daryl held his hand out.

Rick stared at it. "What?"

Daryl looked at the sky. "Hold my hand."

"I'm not going to hold your hand."

"I ain't asking you to go steady, jackass."

"So, you're scared?"

Daryl rolled his eyes. "Yeah. Ok? Well—scared that your head's so messed up you ain't got any depth perception so you're not going to jump far enough. Scared that you'll pass out in the water and get dragged all the way to Savannah. So, yeah, I'm scared, all right?"

Rick smiled and took Daryl's hand. "I'll never let go, Jack."

Daryl cocked his left eyebrow. "Huh?"

"It's from a movie—never mind." Rick glanced back over his shoulder. "My ass is on fire."

"Yeah, well, your whole bottom half is going to burn because we have to take a running start."

" _What_ —?"

The time for talking was over. Daryl pulled Rick back waist-deep into the apartment flames, counted to three, and off they went.

Rick comprehended three things before he lost consciousness.

One, his clothes were on fire.

Two, the coolness of the night air soothed his blistered skin as he sailed through it.

Three, although the two men hit the water, they barely missed landing right on top of Michonne, who was in a canoe.

Daryl didn't remember letting go of Rick's hand. He had it when they jumped, had it when they landed, but the impact turned his extremities into spaghetti and the water was icicle-cold on his skin and he could breathe _there was fire in his lungs and he had to put it out had to breathe water into it to put out the flames then he was drowning back again with Merle and his stupid friends on that dock and Beth was there where was Rick was he alive—_

Daryl broke the surface of the river like a breaching shark. Oxygen returned reality to him. Water that was gripping him a moment ago now cradled him. But he was moving—moving too fast—floating but moving and where was…

Something somersaulted past him. White shirt, cowboy boots, white shirt, cowboy boots, white shirt...

" _Rick_!" Daryl yelled. The other man was lighter, so the water took him faster, and Daryl had to pump his arms and kick his legs with all his might to catch up. More than once the current overpowered him, dragged him from the sight of Rick's body in the forest firelight to a crushing darkness and back again. He finally got a finger through a belt loop in Rick's jeans. He grappled with clothes and limbs, not knowing which way was up until Rick suddenly coughed water right into his face. He was limp, unconscious, but thank-you-God he was coughing which meant that he was breathing. Daryl clung to that fact like his arms clung to Rick's torso.

Trees on the side of the river that _wasn't_ on fire seemed to reach out their limbs to him. Again and again Daryl's hand slipped through their grasp. When he felt his strength abandoning him he tried a new tactic. Most of the arrows in his sheath had been dislodged at impact, but he only needed one. Daryl got a tight grip on an arrow and stabbed it into the side of the riverbed. After two or three attempts he managed to lodge the arrow between two roots. The whiplashed caused by the sudden stop nearly yanked Rick out of his arms, and Daryl cried out in pain when his chest slammed against the embankment. Stars in his eyes briefly blinded him. He waited for the pain to pass before gritting his teeth together and, inch by inch, slowly lifting Rick's body out of the water and onto the damp grass. It took forever and a half but, finally, both Rick and Daryl were out. Rick, still unconscious, lay flat on his stomach with his cheek propped up against his arm. Daryl lay on his back beside him, left forearm lying protectively across Rick's shoulders.

Another forever and a half passed. Daryl focused on nothing but getting all the coughing out of his system and periodically smacking Rick on the back to make sure all the smoke and water was out of his lungs, too. He could see the sun rise barely through the smoke. When Michonne caught up with them not long after, Daryl had passed out, exhausted, and comforted by the lullaby that was his best friend's breaths.

* * *

The bucket brigade stretched from the overflowing river up to the third floor of the Green Tower. Tara was at the beginning, filling each bucket up before passing it down the line. Glenn was at the end, up on the third floor of the burning Green Tower. Each bucket was passed from one hand to the next across the line of 50 or so people. Glenn knew that he probably didn't have enough buckets to reach Rick and Daryl on the fifth floor, but that didn't keep him from trying. At one point he almost cleared a path on the left side of the hall, but just then the right side began to fill with black smoke. He stared at the new flames visible under an apartment door and wracked his brain for a logical reason to explain how the fire went from one side of the building to the other without passing through the rooms in between.

"Glenn— _Glenn_!" Eleanora was right behind him. "Come on, dude, keep going!" She held a bucket in each hand and The Judge, Greg, who was in line after her, was also waiting.

"Take over for me!" Glenn ordered. He ignored Greg and Eleanora's questions and sprinted down the stairs, out the door, and around the building.

Glenn counted at least ten men on three different Red Tower balconies. As he watched, dumbfounded, they lit Molotov cocktails and threw them against the Green Tower. Glenn smelled the gas and alcohol as the devices erupted. For a moment the smoke briefly cleared, and Glenn could see all twenty floors. What he'd just witnessed must have been the eighth or ninth round of cocktails. More than half of the building was on fire. Not just on fire but burning down— _crumbling_.

 _Collapsing_.

Glenn's blood turned to ice. He tried to run in every direction at once—towards the faceless men, towards Maggie, towards Rick...In the extra second that it took his brain to restart, a dozen bricks showered down from the upper floors and landed on a woman rushing between the towers with fire extinguishers in her arms. Screams erupted—more than one of them from Glenn's chest. He sprinted back through the tower doors, took the deepest breath he could muster and shouted loud enough that Greg and Eleanora could hear him as though he was still at their side.

" _Everybody out!_ _The building's falling down_!"

Rosita gave up on trying to move the bulldozer. When the river overflowed into the grass the great machine sunk six inches into the ground. Undoubtedly there was a trick to it, some way to anchor the blade and spin the treads to gain traction, but Rosita just couldn't figure it out.

Suddenly, the cab door flew open. High-pitched shrieks stabbed Rosita's ears and she plugged them with her palms. Tara stood at the door waving at her to get out, shouting her name over and over. Rosita scooched across the seat slowly as if through quicksand. Something heavy hit the bulldozer windshield. Two more objects slammed into the machine, sounding like hail the size of a bowling ball. Behind Tara, a chunk of cement fell from the sky. Rosita watched in awe as it splashed into the river and sent up a mushroom-shaped gusher of water. The reason for the screeching finally dawned on her.

" _Shit_ -!"

"We have to go— _now_!" Tara grabbed Rosita's wrist with both hands and yanked. Both women lost their footing and ended up spread-eagled on their backs in the grass just in time to see the top half of the Green Tower start to slide towards them.

Terror catapulted them to their feet. Rosita and Tara grabbed each other's hands and moved as fast as they could.

The earth beneath the pump house quaked. Dirt and dust shook loose from the rafters and tumbled down onto the chickens, who squawked and jumped off windows and walls, filling the shack with white feathers, making the people inside it feel like they were in a giant snow globe. Maggie gasped and wrapped her arms around a pale Carl, a sobbing Judith, and a gasping Antonio.

"What the hell was that?" Carl yelled over the noise. He started for the door, but Maggie grabbed his hand.

"Carl, no!" she shouted. "I need your help!"

Antonio sat against the wall with his arms around his knees. Beneath his Braves hat, panic widened his eyes beyond their normal limits as the asthma attack refused to let up. Maggie handed Judith off to Carl and took both of Antonio's hands in hers. "Try again," she ordered. "Don't think about what's going on outside—don't even hear it! Just breathe. Breathe in while I count to four and out while I count to six, remember? Starting now, all right? One, two, three, four…"

Carl held Judith against his heart and hunkered down beside Antonio. "Maggie, his lips are turning blue!"

A panicked gargling sound choked out of Antonio's throat and his breaths sped up even more.

"Look at me!" Maggie grasped the boy's face between her hands. "Try again. Try again! Now—One, two, three, four…"

Outside, people were screaming. The ground trembled again, and then a third time. It sounded like a bomb had gone off. And they could smell the fire so clearly, like it was right outside the door. In the distance, more landmines popped and trees cracked. An inch of river water squeezed under the door… Maggie ordered herself not to cry, but she couldn't help it. She only hoped that what was going on outside wasn't as bad as what she imagined.

Another hour passed before the pigs, rabbits, and chickens settled back down, Judith fell asleep, and the only sound that came from outside was a single chirp from a bird that perched on the roof. Antonio finally calmed down, though he was so spent from the lack of oxygen that he could no longer sit up. The small group huddled close together and waited—just waited to see what would happen next.

Before he fell asleep, Antonio whispered to Maggie, " _You're going…to be a…really good mom…_ "

The sun was high in the sky when Michonne paddled the canoe into the moat. It had to be noon, at least. Dragging two full-grown, unconscious men into a tiny boat and rowing upstream with them had taken all morning. Daryl and Rick lay on their backs on the floor, squished together like sardines with Michonne's feet wedged between them. Neither men had stirred since Michonne found them in the woods.

Michonne didn't know what she expected to see but, whatever it was, it wasn't as bad as this. For a long minute she forgot where she was. She allowed the river to steer her as she sat, frozen in shock, staring at what remained of their home.

A pile of rubble sat where the Green Tower used to be. Children looked down in shock at the scene from the Red Tower. Figures walked around the debris slowly, clumsily, not unlike Walkers. Once in a while one of them dug through the bricks or poured a bucket of water over a smoking column of wood. One half-awake man unearthed a body. After he retrieved every limb he pivoted and vomited right on one of the remaining picnic tables. As Michonne watched, the last of the black smoke around the dead building disintegrated and was replaced with white.

Thunder in the distance. Brief lightning on the horizon. Right when the flames finally went out, it began to rain.

* * *

They gathered by the pumphouse at dawn. There was nothing of Carol to bury, but they dug a hole anyway and filled it with letters written to her departed soul. One by one people dropped in scribbled notes written with broken crayons, dying pens, and chipped pencils onto half-burned notebook paper, dirty napkins, and the backings to refrigerator manuals.

Rick felt like his skull was vibrating. He rubbed his eyes with a trembling thumb and forefinger and struggled to maintain his composure. All of Eden was waiting for him to speak and the last thing he wanted to do was vomit right then and there. Rick was no stranger to concussions, but none had left him this dizzy and disoriented. Even his memory was affected. The only reason why he knew how he'd gotten hurt, and why he'd woken up in the pump house with a pig sniffing his boots, was because Daryl was there to tell him what happened. And then Michonne was there to tell them that one of their dearest friends was dead—but she'd taken their enemies out with her. _Hallelujah_.

Rick must have taken a minute longer to recover than he meant to because Daryl's calloused fingers touched the back of his neck, startling him back into reality. "Rick, I can handle this," Glenn offered softly.

Rick shook his head. "No, I'm ok," he assured his friends. When Daryl's gentle grip didn't let up, Rick looked around and up at him and repeated, "I'm ok."

Daryl had aged in the past day. The circles beneath his eyes were darker, the crow's feet deeper. And no matter how much he blinked, a thin layer of water hovered in his eyes. Rick hadn't seen him look so devastated since Beth died.

 _Carol_.

The thought of her stabbed Rick's heart like a blade. Somehow the pain focused his mind and he was able to gather his thoughts. He cleared his throat and began to speak.

"We have a lot to be thankful for," Rick said. He looked around the group and made eye contact with every pair of eyes there. "And we've lost a lot. The people in the fire, the people we exiled who betrayed us to the Pierce's… But now—at least for now—we can all be at peace because one woman sacrificed herself to destroy our enemies." Rick took a deep breath. Daryl shifted behind him and Rick didn't have to look to know that he'd folded his arms against his chest and bowed his head.

Rick felt Carl's presence beside Daryl. He sensed Glenn and Maggie, Michonne, and Tara and Rosita. He envisioned where they could all be a month from now—a year—three. They had years ahead because of, and thanks to, Carol.

"I miss Carol. This community will miss Carol. But because of her that's what we will continue to be: a community. Together," Rick said, "together, we'll survive."

 **The End**


End file.
